ELGIN (AP) - The Air Force is proposing to expand its training space into the southwest corner of North Dakota.

If the plan goes through, it would affect B-52s at Minot Air Force Base and B-1s at Ellsworth Air Force Base in South Dakota.

Air Force officers met with area residents Wednesday in Bowman and planned a meeting Thursday in Elgin.

"I haven't heard a thing against it," Elgin Mayor Norman Schock said. "I'm thinking people are going to be glad to see airplanes again."

The Air Force wants to triple the size of the current Powder River Training Complex that skirts parts of Montana, South Dakota, and Wyoming. The changes would expand the complex into much of southwestern North Dakota.

The current air training zone allows only one mission of two planes to train at a time. The expanded zone would allow four missions of eight planes to train.

"If we are able to get this airspace, we are able to maintain a higher level of combat-ready crews throughout the year," Air Force Maj. Doug Bodine said.

To train all the required missions, the Air Force now must fly some bombers all the way to Nevada, Kansas, and Utah.

"For one hour of training time, you are talking significant more hours of air frame time due to transit," Bodine said.

The expanded training zone also would allow planes from the Dakotas to stay there. The Air Force said that could save up to $15 million per year.

An expansion of the zone would take at least three years, the Air Force said.

"We don't think it'll change life as far as the city is concerned. The farmers may run into problems with their cattle or whatever's penned up," Schock said.

But it would be no worse than Air Force bombing runs over the town in the 1980s, he said.

"We lived through their bombing runs. We'll live through this," Schock said.