One year after a May 16, 2025, fire severely damaged a portion of the hourly parking garage at Jacksonville International Airport, the Aviation Authority moved forward with plans to demolish a portion of the structure to rebuild.
The authority began soliciting bids for the job May 16.
The JAA board unanimously approved funding for the project June 18, 2025, when Chief Financial Officer Ross Jones estimated reconstruction would cost about $38 million. Director of External Affairs Michael Stewart said then the project would be funded through a combination of JAA funds and insurance.
Jones also estimated at the time $3.7 million in lost revenue due to 500 parking spaces being offline. That included losses in hourly and rental car parking, as well as security fees.
JAA spokesman Greg Willis said the reconstruction will take place in phases, with demolition being phase one. The entire project is expected to take about a year to complete.
As of May 20, the authority had received 40 bids from demolition companies ahead of a June 16 deadline.
Willis would not comment on the estimated budget for the initial phase.
The fire broke out in the southern portion of the garage, compromising two floors. Fire investigators said at the time they believed a BMW X3 started the fire.
The incident was the largest disaster in the airport’s history and forced the cancellation of 37 flights, but no injuries were reported, JAA board member Michelle Barnett said. As part of the emergency response, the authority assessed the situation within 10 minutes, escorted evacuated passengers, executed a shelter-in-place mandate and set up a call center, according to JAA Chief Operation Officer Tony Cugno.
To ease ongoing parking concerns, a separate, new daily parking garage under construction is slated to open this fall, adding 2,000 spaces to airport capacity.
Cugno said the new structure would not feature fire sprinklers because Florida building codes exempt open-air parking structures of fewer than 12,000 square feet from the mandate. If the code changes, JAA will comply, he said.