The Beaumont Hotel and Grass Strip, the Kansas Town Where You Land on the Turf, Taxi Down Main Street, and Park Your Airplane at the Water Tower

In Beaumont, Kansas, you can land a small airplane on a 2,400-foot grass strip, taxi off the turf directly onto a public street, and park in front of the Beaumont Hotel, which has been serving travelers since 1879. The airport, identifier 07S, sits in the tallgrass Flint Hills southeast of Wichita, and its most famous feature is that airplanes and pickup trucks share the same road right up to the hotel’s front porch. It’s one of the last places in America where flying into town still means literally flying into town.

Where Is Beaumont and What Makes It Unique?

Beaumont is a tiny community - a few dozen residents - set in the Flint Hills of Kansas, some of the last surviving tallgrass prairie on the continent. Fly southeast out of Wichita and the landscape rolls out green and gold and largely empty: cattle country, big sky, no sprawl.

What sets Beaumont apart is that the runway and the road are essentially the same idea. You land on grass alongside the town, then taxi onto a street that airplanes and vehicles share, rolling past houses to a tie-down spot beside the water tower and the hotel.

Your primary visual landmark on arrival is a silver water tower built in 1985, standing beside the strip like a lighthouse for pilots flying into a small prairie town.

What Is the Airport at Beaumont Like?

The field is a genuine turf runway of about 2,400 feet, oriented roughly northwest to southeast, at a field elevation of roughly 1,500 to 1,600 feet. It carries the identifier 07S and appears on the sectional chart - this is a real airport, not an improvised landing.

But it asks you to actually be a pilot. There’s no paved 4,200-foot runway, no long overrun, no fire truck standing by. It’s grass, and grass behaves differently from pavement: it’s softer, it slows your rollout faster, but it’s less forgiving when it’s wet, soft, or long. Your takeoff roll will be longer, especially on a warm Kansas afternoon when density altitude climbs and the air turns thin.

After landing, you taxi off the end of the strip and turn onto the street. Pilots typically add a little power and S-turn to see over the nose, then taxi a Cessna, Cub, or Bonanza down the lane, past a couple of houses, to tie down near the tower.

Why Is the Beaumont Hotel So Special?

The Beaumont Hotel was built in 1879 - just 14 years after the Civil War ended, and before the Wright brothers were born. The building predates the airplane itself, yet its modern identity is built entirely around aviation.

It began as a cattle-town and railroad-town establishment. The Frisco line came through, cowboys drove longhorns up from Texas, and the hotel fed and housed them. It’s a two-story, white clapboard building with a long front porch - roughly 140 years of history under one roof.

As the trains faded and highways pulled traffic elsewhere, Beaumont could have vanished like so many small plains towns. What saved it was the grass strip: the chance to park your airplane on the street and eat homemade pie turned into a bucket-list destination and “hundred dollar hamburger” run for pilots across the middle of the country. The Oshkosh crowd routes through, cross-country flyers plan fuel stops around it, and flying clubs make a full day of it.

Inside, the walls are covered with photographs of airplanes and pilots going back decades, many of whom signed the wall and became part of the place. The coffee is hot and steady, and the pie is homemade with real crust - eaten with your airplane parked in view out the window.

What Is a Fly-In Weekend at Beaumont Like?

On a good weekend the grass ramp doubles as a front yard, with airplanes lined up nose to nose: a yellow Piper Cub, a Cessna 172 unloading a family, a polished Cessna 180 tailwheel, a Bonanza, and a few Van’s RVs ticking as they cool. The air smells like cut grass, warm engine oil, and bacon drifting from the kitchen.

The defining feature is that everyone in the room flew there. Unlike an ordinary restaurant, every person arrived by pointing a nose at the water tower and setting down on the turf, so conversation flows naturally - strangers for a few seconds, friends for the afternoon.

Regulars describe it as what flying is supposed to feel like: no badge, no gate, no clearance required - just a pilot, an airplane, and a town genuinely glad to see you land on its street.

How Do I Fly Into Beaumont Safely?

Beaumont rewards preparation. Follow these steps before you go:

Get turf experience first. If you’ve never landed on grass, don’t make Beaumont your solo first attempt. Fly with an instructor, because grass changes your ground roll, takeoff distance, and margins.
Do your homework under FAR 91.103. Gather all available information about the field and conditions before departure.
Call ahead and check conditions. A grass strip that’s firm on Saturday can be a boggy mess after a Thursday thunderstorm. Flint Hills weather is real; verify the field is usable.
Plan for density altitude. On a warm day at roughly 1,500–1,600 feet elevation, your takeoff roll grows - brief your performance numbers.
Respect the shared road. You’ll taxi where vehicles travel. Go slow, keep your eyes out, and remember you’re pilot in command of an airplane on a public street.

Finally, be a good guest. Beaumont survives because generations of pilots have treated the town and hotel with respect - paying tie-down fees, ordering pie, and adding their stories to the wall. Places like this are rare now; grass strips woven into small towns have mostly disappeared. Beaumont endures precisely because pilots keep showing up and keep it alive.

Key Takeaways

Beaumont, Kansas (airport 07S) lets you land on a 2,400-foot grass strip, taxi down a public street, and park beside the water tower at the Beaumont Hotel.
The Beaumont Hotel dates to 1879, predating the airplane, and today thrives as a pilot fly-in destination famous for coffee and homemade pie.
The runway is turf, oriented roughly northwest–southeast at about 1,500–1,600 feet elevation - get grass experience and mind density altitude.
Comply with FAR 91.103, call ahead for field conditions, and taxi carefully on the shared road.
Beaumont is one of the last living examples of small-town prairie aviation, sustained by pilots who treat it well.