Portal:Hudson Valley/Selected article/9

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Stewart International Airport (IATA: SWF, ICAO: KSWF) is located near Newburgh, New York, in the southern Hudson Valley, 55 miles (88.5 km) north of New York City and, 15 miles (23 km) west of Poughkeepsie, NY . Originally developed in the 1930s as a military base to allow cadets at the nearby United States Military Academy at West Point to learn aviation, it has over the years grown into the major passenger airport for the mid-Hudson region and continues to serve as a military airfield as well, currently housing the 105th Airlift Wing of the New York Air National Guard and Marine Aerial Refueler Transport Squadron 452 (VMGR-452) of the United States Marine Corps Reserve. The space shuttle could also land at Stewart in an emergency. It has made history in several ways. After its closure as an active Air Force base in the early 1970s, an ambitious plan by former Governor Nelson Rockefeller to greatly expand and develop the airport led to a bitter and protracted struggle with local landowners that led to reforms in the state's eminent domain laws but no actual development of the land acquired.