Hi’ my name is Ernie Wilkins I’m 85 years old and work as A Financial Consultant I do Feasibility Studies / Market Analysis and sometime Appraisals for Private Investors to determined property value and the highest and best use, I worked for Commercial Credit for over 15 years in San Jose Ca. until Owners “Control Data” sold us in1984 to Morris Plan.
 I moved to Atwater Ca. (Central Valley) in 1985, Castle AFB was still open and closed in 1995 https://www.co.merced.ca.us/1241/Foreign-Trade-Zone---FTZ-226
 A good friend name Joe Rivero who was A Merced County Supervisor and Valley Farmer went to China to get An AG Export Agreement, he was successful in getting Castle Status change to An International Foreign Trade Zone 226, Joe passed a year later and the trade zone has never been used.

At the time in 1997 I developed a proposed Theme Park design to use AG as my theme because the AG Industry in The San Joaquin Valley is the largest in the world, Theme Park News Articles Attached.

About The Agriculture Industry
First, long-term demand remains essential for sustained growth. For example, the 2019 preliminary estimate of almond-bearing acreage in California was 1,170,000 acres – nearly double the bearing acres in 2009.3 To date, the almond industry has done an outstanding job of creating demand, but will need to continue to do so, particularly if international trade disputes continue.  The gross value of agricultural production for 2018 was $2,594,246,000. This represents a 2.62% increase over the 2017 value of $2,527,989,00
About three (3) month ago I was asked if Castle could become a Passenger Airport?, I Re-Visited my old plans and did another Feasibility Study On Castle Air Force Base for the purpose of finding out if Castle could be used as an “International Destination” meaning that could travels from around the world that visit Yosemite National Park each year which represent about 12 -15 Million People from all over the World.

To my surprise’ What I found out was “Highway 120 Is a Direct Link to All of The Business that Travelers Use to Go to Yosemite National Park and along the way the visitors go to about 15 different location on hwy 120 such as
“Skiing – Sight Seeing – Boating – Several Local Town’s (Oakhurst/ The Mono Craters - Mono Lake - Mono Mills - wild Horses - Benton Range (beautiful rock formations worthy of State National Park status) -  Benton Hot Springs was Established in 1852 - The Town of Benton
 
And it’s the “ONLY” road that could be used to access the sites in The Sierra Mountains. (Sites Attached)
 These Two (2) Websites will give you some idea of the traffic on HWY 120 to Yosemite Park.

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 | CA Highway 120 Adventure Through YosemiteStaffState Route 120 in Northern California is about 206 miles long. Let’s take a journey along this historic road fr...


My Feasibility Study Conclusions was design to “Fly Traveler’s Into Castle” because they come to this County to see Yosemite so why fly into LA/Oakland/San Francisco and travel by either Bus or Rent a Vehicle and drive to Yosemite, when they can come to Castle and take a “Tramway to Yosemite which is only 45 minutes away.

My research suggested that up to 25 million visitors could fly into Castle Annually, “The Tramway” is the most “Newest” Exciting Venture for travels to enjoy, and most of them have never been on a Tramway.

For background information and my latest research I have attached three (3) files with this message for you to review, I’ll send three more attachments with the next message, thanks for reviewing this project.

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