Quote:
Originally Posted by Austin1971
The airport has already outgrown its' capacity. During high volume periods it is almost impossible to navigate the central concourse and the baggage claim level is a nightmare.
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You can partially blame the airlines for the lack of circulating space within the airport. Here's an excerpt from an Austin Chronicle article from way back in 2003:
Shadows Over Bergstrom
The new reality puts the squeeze on our 'Austin-style' airport
By Mike Clark-Madison, Fri., Jan. 24, 2003
Quote:
Originally Posted by The Austin Chronicle
"Airport costs are only about 4% of an airline's expense," he [Aviation Director Jim Smith] notes, "so the cost difference between us and a cheaper airport isn't going to make or break an airline. But [the airlines] are nonetheless aggressive" about containing costs and negotiating their deals with Bergstrom.
[SNIP]
"When this airport was being built, the airlines put enough pressure on the city to reduce the size of the terminal -- by about 10 feet in major passageways," Smith continues. "Now, though, we're in a mode of building an addition to the terminal to house the security operation and equipment, which we wouldn't have had to do if the city had built the Barbara Jordan Terminal to its original size. "But you have to negotiate. The airlines are a community's business partner, since you wouldn't have an airport without them."
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Austin1971
The airport authority is finally breaking ground on the east apron expansion with completion slated for April of '12. They have to finish that project before they can do anything else. We're looking at 2016-17 at the earliest for terminal expansion completion.
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I realize it's frustrating for passengers - especially during the peak times - but I don't really see how the airport could have expanded until now because of a decline in passengers (and the revenue they bring).
Here's the annual passenger totals from as far back as 2005:
2005 - 7,683,545
2006 - 8,261,310 (up 7.52%)
2007 - 8,885,391 (up 7.6%)
2008 - 9,039,075 (up 1.7%)
2009 - 8,217,926 (down 9.1%)
2010 - 8,693,708 (up 5.9%)
If you remember, there were plans to expand the terminal back in 2008, because we'd had 3 years of solid growth and that was expected to continue. Back in May of 2008, Expressjet still had some of their branded operations, Viva Aerobus came to town, JetBlue doubled it's number of daily departures from 4 to 8, and some of the incumbent carriers added new destinations. The first half of the year we were up something like 10-12% Then shortly afterwards, fuel spiked, the economy tanked and traffic fell sharply. Then there was the whole swine flu scare and that didn't help Viva Aerobus any. An airport needs continued passenger growth to fund all these expansions and our growth didn't continue. It shrank and we're just now catching up.