A love of flying created the Foothills Aerodrome neighborhood, but a sense of community keeps it grounded.
Tucked into the rolling countryside southeast of Simpsonville, Foothills Aerodrome is an enclave of aviation, a place where those who’d rather be flying have made a lifestyle of it.
Steve Barbour, president of Foothills Aerodrome Homeowners Association, is a soft-spoken, longtime commercial airline pilot and Air Force veteran who flew an A-10 in the first Gulf War and later piloted an F-15C, before serving as a flight instructor.
He moved into the community 22 years ago, back when the lots were “covered in kudzu” as he describes it. Now the community is notable for its custom-built private homes and well-maintained grounds, which, instead of backyard pools, feature backyard hangars.
“Some people live at the lake, some people live on a golf course, some people live at the beach,” Barbour says. “These people like airplanes.”
There are 19 homes bordering the 3,200-foot, gently rolling grass airstrip with room for a couple more. And depending on what you’re flying, it’s 70 minutes to Hilton Head, 85 minutes to Myrtle Beach, 45 minutes to Atlanta and 65 minutes to Chattanooga.
Fly-in, fly-out communities like Foothills Aerodrome are rare in the Upstate, but Barbour points out that private airstrips are plentiful, and the private aviation community is bustling.
“There are seven private airstrips within seven miles of here,” Barbour says between sips of fresh-brewed sweet tea. His 1947 North American Aviation Navion single-engine plane is parked in the hangar a few yards from his covered back porch.
For Barbour, private aviation is a welcome diversion from the stress of commercial flying.
“Commercial aviation, you’re managing an airplane; you’re a systems manager,” he says. “There’s a little bit of hand flying but mostly you’re on autopilot. This, though, is pure flying… landing on a grass strip.”
Through the years, though, Foothills Aerodrome has become more than a place to park an airplane a few feet from where you lay your head. As a matter of fact, Barbour would rather talk about his neighbors than their airplanes, offering up how a shared love of aviation has fostered a deep and abiding sense of community.
The 58-year-old recalls New Year’s Eve 2020, the day he lost his father. Because COVID-19-related protocols limited visitation, Barbour had been unable to share those final, crucial moments with his dad. Crushed by the experience, Barbour, who’d lost his wife to ovarian cancer just a few months earlier, found himself alone.
“I’m sitting here New Year’s Eve, 42 degrees, misty, raining,” he recalls. “I sent an email and text to every resident out here… ‘Meet me at the windsock at eight o’clock.'”
The community
Everybody in the community showed up to honor his dad, who had also been a fighter pilot.
“We sat there, made a toast… sat out there for an hour and had a good ole time in the misty, nasty rain,” he says. “The passion for aviation brings you here. The sense of community will keep you here.”
When an engine failure forced Barbour’s neighbor, Bill Clute, to land his Citabria airplane about eight miles from home in 2020, the community rallied around him, too.
“I landed in a field; it was about five o’clock on a Saturday evening,” Clute remembers. “They came out with tools and two flatbed trailers. By nine o’clock, we had that airplane unloaded in my hangar.”
Clute, a computer programmer by day, performs aerobatics in a Pitts single-seat biplane parked 50 yards from the basketball goal in the family driveway he and wife, Suzanne, share with their two teenage girls. Despite the frenetic pace of life with two high schoolers, Clute says he spends about an hour a week vaulting skyward to practice his maneuvers.
“It’s his happy place,” Suzanne says. “For me, marrying Bill, being introduced to this and it being part of our life — pilots are unique people. They have that instant connection. They have a unique bond.”
“Fly-in, fly-out” communities in the Upstate
Foothills Aerodrome is not the only “fly-in, fly-out” community in the Upstate. There are a few others: Williamsport Airpark near Easley, Chandelle Airpark in Greer, and Oakhill Airpark in Belton.
And, they come in all shapes and sizes, according to information listed on the Federal Aviation Administration registration site.
Williamsport Airpark in Easley, for example, is home to a 2,400-foot-long-by-75-foot-wide grass runway where 14 single-engine planes and one multi-engine plane are based.
Oakhill Airpark is similar, with a 2,400-foot-long-by-100-foot-wide grass runway that 15 aircraft of various types call home.
Meanwhile, Chandelle, in Greer, is home to 18 single-engine airplanes, a helicopter, a glider and three ultralights all with access to a pair of concrete runways – one that is 4,200 feet long and another that is 5,500 feet long. There are also a pair of turf runways – one that is 2,100 feet long and another that is 3,450 feet long.
In all, South Carolina boasts 16 fly-in, fly-out communities that are registered with the FAA, according to information available at www.carolinaairparks.com.
Wondering what the buy-in is for the fly-in, fly-out life? A couple of 1.21-acre lots at Chandelle Airpark that sold in April, 2022, listed for $160,000, each, according to the airpark’s website.
