While the only scheduled commercial airline - SkyValue - pulled out of the Gary/Chicago International Airport, and that facility is once again left with no passenger service, Peotone airport opponents, take heart.

The situation at Gary does not automatically translate into Peotone being the only fallback position for capacity-starved Illinois airports. Gary is not the only game in town.

There is another - Rockford — in Winnebago County. Formerly the Greater Rockford Airport, the new and improved Chicago/Rockford International Airport, is now ranked the tenth-fastest growing airport in the nation.

Both Rockford and Gary follow a similar prescription - ignore the Peotone fray and move forward with plans to become a reliever airport for O’Hare. Gary has had another setback. Rockford is enjoying success.

The reality of the situation gives rise to further evidence that a need for another airport at Peotone is far from reality.

In recent years, Rockford has surged in capacity, consistently adding destinations and serving the region with non-stop flights to U.S. cities, seasonal vacation spots, and international locations.

Chicago/Rockford is located 67 miles northwest of Chicago’s O’Hare and about 80 miles south of Madison, Wisconsin. It is only slightly farther from O’Hare than Peotone. Its proximity provides another choice to passengers enroute to Chicago or those just flying through, enroute to some other location.

Last month Rockford logged almost 20,000 passengers, which marks a 45-percent increase over last year. The goal is 250,000 passengers per year.

The airport, has just received a $750,000 federal grant to be used to build a jet bridge, or enclosed walkway from the airport terminal to allow passengers to board planes in all types of weather.

Last month new signs were erected on tollways, interstates, and state highways directing visitors to the Chicago/Rockford International Airport.

As Chuck Sweeny, columnist from the Rockford Register Star writes, "Normally, new signs would not be a big deal. But nothing to do with the state’s recent relationship with Rockford’s airport has been normal."

Sweeny referred to the political tornado surrounding Peotone with its attempt to make Rockford part of its debris field.

In a recent column, he described the recent history of Illinois politics as it relates to aviation, corroborating the belief of Peotone airport opponents.

"For years, the state’s transportation policy dictated that the Rockford airport (RFD) would not grow. Kirk Brown, the IDOT secretary under former Gov. George Ryan, was so strongly against growth at RFD that the department created a myth: RFD was "landlocked" by two rivers, creeks and built-up areas, so it could not possibly become a busy airport that could relieve congestion at Chicago O’Hare. Never mind that all night long, huge UPS jets were zooming in and out of the very same "landlocked" airport. That, for IDOT’s bureaucrats, was an inconvenient truth. So they ignored it."

Sweeny went on to explain why a governor would try to thwart economic growth in northwest Illinois.

"The state wanted to build an airport at Peotone in Will County... Illinois leaders didn’t want growth at Rockford’s airport to hinder the creation of Peotone," Sweeny wrote.

But Sweeny said Brown’s anti-Rockford propaganda was finally thwarted by U.S. Rep. Don Manzullo, R-Egan, who said, "This man has no idea of what the Rockford airport can do, and it is so obvious that he is hell-bent on spending billions of taxpayer dollars on a new airport at Peotone that he is blinded to reality as to the capability of the Rockford airport."

Brown’s remarks were made in March 2002 after he testified to a congressional committee that Rockford could not be a reliever airport.

Three years later, in April 2005 Larry Morrissey, an Independent and co-founder of the Greater Rockford Transportation Coalition were elected mayor. He and Dave Lindberg, the former president of the airport advocacy group were tireless supporters of the Chicago/Rockford airport. Opposition to the proposed Peotone airport rang throughout Morrissey’s campaign.