Tropic Air was founded 30 years ago as Tropical Airline service –
since then it’s become the Belizean airline that moves the greatest number
of passengers. And this weekend they took a giant leap forward with the opening
of the multi million dollar main terminal in San Pedro. We visited this weekend
and found out when a building is more than just concrete and furniture.
Jules Vasquez Reporting,
It cost $4.6 million and the new Tropic Air Terminal is the cornerstone for
Tropic air’s operations.
John Grief, Tropic Air President
“Domestic is definitely our priority. We wish Maya all the success
in the world with what they’re doing. We don’t think it is our particular
area of expertise. We believe that here at home in Belize domestically and with
possible exception of Flores and maybe Roatan, it is where Tropic belongs and 
this building and the purchasing of eleven new aircrafts last year is cementing
our position in the domestic market.”
The terminal does suitably impress with a modern, stylish and quite corporate
design complete with a glowing life-sized aquarium where lionfish and lobster
share the same space. And while it has looks to space, Grief says functionality
was the priority.
John Grief,
“We designed the building around flow; we said passengers come in,
passengers, bags come in and bags come out so we drew that flow down and we
put a building around it. We didn’t want just a big empty warehouse for
people. We wanted something that can kind of said wow when you walked in and
I think we found it with the aquarium.”
And flow does matter in this terminal which Grief says processes over five
thousand passengers daily travelling on the close to 100 tropic flights coming
in and out of this terminal everyday. It’s a sizeable investment made
in grim financial times for a declining tourism industry, and for that reason 
one the government – represented by both the Prime Minister and the Minister
of Tourism seemed eager to demonstrate support for it.
John Grief,
“Actually halfway through this project the world economy took a bit
of a nosedive and we were very widely criticized within our company and without
by spending all this money in such uncertain economic times. But we felt that
the economy is cyclical, it swung bad and it will swing good again so we went
ahead. But it definitely has affected our business.”
Hon. Manuel Heredia Jr., Minister of Tourism
“We have been knocking at the doors of all airlines who have been
meeting with travel agents and this particular building proves that there is
confidence in our administration and that even with the hard times, the economy
being that bad, they are willing to invest.”
John Grief,
“I actually think the present government is making a lot of right
moves. Minister Heredia has got a firm grasp of the situation, he seems to have
a lot of support from Mr. Prime Minister and Cabinet and everybody else so we
think all their moves are the right moves.”
A worthy commendation from the president of a company that just put four and
a half million dollars in the ground, but the truth is they’re in this
together and for that investor confidence to not wear thin, Government will
now have to do its part to make the promise of this investment real. Heredia
seemed confident even prophetic
Hon. Manuel Heredia Jr.,
“I have strong confidence that come 2010, you will start to see the
beginning of a different era in the tourism industry.”
The terminal was designed by Anthony Thurton.
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