News File Photo Crews are seen working on the exterior of the new Alpena County Regional Airport terminal in this October 2019 photo.

ALPENA — Construction of the new airport terminal in Alpena has been moving along smoothly but recently ran into a few small snags that will boost costs by about $24,000 and push back the ribbon-cutting ceremony into the late spring.

The terminal will be operational as planned on Jan. 16, when the first flight will launch, but crews will have to finish some small odds and ends that will need to be completed in spring.

Airport Manager Steve Smigelski said the county is being forced to install new gas piping into the facility after DTE Energy failed to sign off on the current design, which the utility had approved two years ago.

Smigelski said DTE has changed certain standards since first approving the plan and now insists the county abide by the new regulations, which means the unused pipes currently in the terminal will need to be removed and replaced with larger-diameter ones.

“They have a new safety policy that was enacted in the last six months and our consultant has been fighting with them for five months about how this was already in the plan, but it looks like we are going to have to do it, because they are refusing to budge,” Smigelski said.

Besides the pipe work, Smigelski said the early arrival of snow and cold also impacted a few of the projects that needed to be done on the exterior of the building.

He said the parking lots need to be sealed and there are a pair of retaining walls on the side of the facility that were supposed to be built. Those projects, as well as the landscaping, are now going to have to wait until spring.

Smigelski said those delays won’t inhibit operations, which will begin in the new terminal in January, but it made sense to hold off on the ribbon-cutting until everything is done.

“I don’t think people are going to want to see rebar sticking out of the ground and orange barrels all over the parking lot,” he said. “But the new terminal will be up and running on the 16th.”

Steve Schulwitz can be reached at 989-358-5689 at sschulwitz@thealpenanews.com. Follow him on Twitter @ss_alpenanews.com.