The rectangles shown above are concrete paving sections which workers were busy pouring Thursday on the 41-32 runway at Cox Field Airport in Paris. The next picture shows the cement actually being poured in. (Photo courtesy of City of Paris city engineer Shawn Napier.)
This is part of Phase II of a runway improvement project at Cox Field. The main runway — 6,000 feet long — was resurfaced about 18 months ago, and the taxiways also got a new surface. (Photo courtesy of City of Paris city engineer Shawn Napier.)
This photo from the plane of Billy Copeland, a member of the City of Paris airport advisory board, was taken by Shane Grissom, an engineering technician with the city’s engineering, planning and development department. Looking from south to north at Cox Field, the photo shows the main runway (left) with its new surface, and the airport’s two other runways. Thursday’s concrete work was done on Runway 41-32 (which runs southeast from the top of the main runway). Since this picture was taken, the taxiway (running to the west of, and parallel to, the main runway) has also gotten a new surface. Cox Field, an old Army airfield, easily accommodates corporate jets from companies such as Campbell Soup, Kimberly Clark, Turner Pipe and various companies that fly in to consider Paris as a place to locate.
Resurfacing work should be completed by early August as the City of Paris completes planning for a Sept. 22 fly-in at the airport — which will be the city’s first since 2008, city engineer Shawn Napier says.
Charles Richards Charles Richards moved to Paris in 2004 after retiring from a 40-year career in journalism – the last 26 years as a news writer and sports writer with The Associated Press in Dallas and Washington, D.C. In mid-2004, The Paris News coaxed him out of retirement, and he began covering the police, court and regional beat for The Paris News. Then in early 2005, he was switched to coverage of a sharply divided Paris City Council. He was appointed by the City Council in 2006 to the 12-member City Charter Review Commission, which extensively rewrote the outmoded document. His writing awards include two first-place awards in statewide competition for feature writing. The most recent was his 2005 story on a Paris doctor’s startling use of leeches in a successful attempt to re-attach a man’s severed ear. Over his career, Richards’ interview subjects include Alabama Gov. George Wallace, President Bill Clinton, President George W. Bush, David Koresh, Arnold Palmer, Muhammad Ali and numerous other political and sports figures. He is an alumnus of Texas Tech, where he was editor of the school newspaper. He lives in Paris with his wife, Barbara, who is retired after 30 years as a teacher and high school counselor.
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