Hudson Valley Regional Airport , formerly known as Dutchess County Airport, is a county-owned public-use airport located on State Route 376 in the Town of Wappinger, Dutchess County, New York, United States, four miles (6 km) south of the central business district of Poughkeepsie. It is sometimes called Poughkeepsie Airport, which gives it the code POU. The airport provides corporate and general aviation transportation services. History Hudson Valley Regional Airport was built by the United States Department of Commerce in the 1930s and was used for pilot training during World War II by the US Army Air Forces. Known as New Hackensack Field at the time for the adjacent hamlet in Wappingers, it was used by students at nearby West Point and as an extension of military training conducted at Stewart Field. On British Prime Minister Winston Churchill flew from Naval Air Station Anacostia to New Hackensack Field, where he was met by President Franklin D. Roosevelt, who had driven from his Hyde Park home. After the Second World War, the airport was turned over to the county for the sum of $1 and guarantees that it would remain open as part of the Surplus Property Act of 1944 by the War Assets Administration. It was then used for general aviation. IBM built a hangar and based its corporate aircraft and helicopters at the airport, including Gulfstream II jets in the 1970s–1980s. In the 1970s, Cessna built and ran a Cessna Citation maintenance facility on the airport grounds. Scheduled air service In the 1950s, scheduled air carrier service was provided at Dutchess County Airport by Colonial Airlines. Its service to POU in 1956 was a DC-3 aircraft from New York City's LaGuardia Airport, making an 11:50 am Monday-Friday flag stop en route to Montreal, Quebec and Ottawa, Ontario in Canada, with intermediate stops at Albany, New York, and Burlington, Vermont. In the 1960s–1980s, the airport had commuter airline service by Command Airways, Colgan Airways, Air North, and others. Command Airways, later known as American Eagle Airlines, maintained its hub, executive offices, and maintenance facilities at the airport. Command qualified the ATR 72 with the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) for U.S. flight operations at the airport. In September 1980, the airport opened its current terminal building for airline passengers. When Stewart International Airport, which is located just across the Hudson River, started commercial operations in 1990, most commercial airline service ended