We need a new airport!!!

[pash]

.

[KCFan]

So they were supposed to keep terminal A open just for United? I'm not sure how many gates United has, but I don't think it's that many (maybe 4). I seriously doubt keeping United there by themselves would dramatically impact the experience flying out of terminal C. It certainly wouldn't impact terminal B at all, which is the worst of the two terminals. You realize Southwest had the option of moving to terminal A and having it all to themselves, right? They passed and said build a new terminal. KCI is what it is. It was never designed for the security measures in a post 9/11 world. Better to just accept that and let's get the airport built right this time.

[grovester]

But it's more titillating to see it as a machiavellian scheme.

[flyingember]

I'm a bit bewildered by the rhetorical Rube Goldberg machines several of you are trotting out to deny and excuse what is obvious: closing Terminal A vastly worstened the experience of flying out of KCI, period.

No, it didn't. The airport basically lost every customer in A over the course of a few years.

Midwest Airlines in A merged with Frontier in C
Continental in A merged with United in C. They all temp moved into A while renovating space in C.
US Airways in A merged with American in C.

[pash]

Technically right, essentially wrong—as usual, flyingember. None of those flights went away in net. KCI has more flights and more passengers today than ever. They just decided to cram all of them into two terminals rather than three.

You realize Southwest had the option of moving to terminal A and having it all to themselves, right? They passed and said build a new terminal.

Do you have a source for this claim? Southwest was opposed to the plan to build a new terminal until after Terminal A was shuttered, and I have not seen anything from outside of Internet message boards that suggests they were offered the option to move into a Terminal A. All of the reporting at the time of Terminal A's closure noted that it was closed in preparation for building a new terminal on the site.

KCI is what it is. It was never designed for the security measures in a post 9/11 world. Better to just accept that and let's get the airport built right this time.

I fully acknowledge KCI's failures. What I don't understand is why so many supporters of building a new terminal won't acknowledge that many of KCI's worst failures are due to the needless overcrowding caused by closing a third of the airport's gates and passenger area. Why have we been suffering through this mess for three years—and whatever happens with a new terminal, it looks like we're going to keep suffering for at last a long into the future—when the immediate fix is right there, sitting empty and disused?

I mean, I have a hunch about the answer, but it still baffles me.

[KCPowercat]

Who would you put in A pash? Southwest declined to move.

[shinatoo]

I don't know if we can, or ever will, become a hub, or get real international flights if we build a new terminal. But I do know that we can't, and never will, if we don't.

Our terminals are holding the city back.

[cityscape]

Technically right, essentially wrong—as usual, flyingember. None of those flights went away in net. KCI has more flights and more passengers today than ever. They just decided to cram all of them into two terminals rather than three.

You realize Southwest had the option of moving to terminal A and having it all to themselves, right? They passed and said build a new terminal.

Do you have a source for this claim? Southwest was opposed to the plan to build a new terminal until after Terminal A was shuttered, and I have not seen anything from outside of Internet message boards that suggests they were offered the option to move into a Terminal A. All of the reporting at the time of Terminal A's closure noted that it was closed in preparation for building a new terminal on the site.

KCI is what it is. It was never designed for the security measures in a post 9/11 world. Better to just accept that and let's get the airport built right this time.

I fully acknowledge KCI's failures. What I don't understand is why so many supporters of building a new terminal won't acknowledge that many of KCI's worst failures are due to the needless overcrowding caused by closing a third of the airport's gates and passenger area. Why have we been suffering through this mess for three years—and whatever happens with a new terminal, it looks like we're going to keep suffering for at last a long into the future—when the immediate fix is right there, sitting empty and disused?

I mean, I have a hunch about the answer, but it still baffles me.

Pash, you don't seem to understand airline operations. Let's say we move Southwest to Terminal A. We still have a similar problem. While there are more gates to use, those gates cannot support the aircraft that use them now. Airplanes today while similar to those in the past cram a LOT more people into the same space (in some cases 30% more than in 1970). That increase in passengers per plane is what is causing the problem with our current gates/terminals. As stated above, there isn't enough depth to manage all those needing to board a flight. It is the main reason TWA stopped flying the 747 (which wasn't flying when KCI was designed) in/out of KC, there wasn't enough room to manage all the passengers boarding that large of a plane and they even had the entire terminal depth without security like today. This airport was/is not designed to meet the demands of airlines today. It speaks volumes that the airlines are willing to take on any cost overruns for a new terminal versus renovating the existing ones. As the public we need to acknowledge (since most of us aren't airline operators) that airlines don't see our current design as a benefit and in fact are limiting their plans with expanding flights to/from KC. The demand is there, the facility is not. Moving to A would not solve the problems, it creates more by increasing operations costs.

[KCFan]

KCI still isn't back to the passenger traffic the airport did pre-9/11. The record passenger count was 11.9 million in 2000 and 2001 would have hit more than 12 million passengers had 9/11 not derailed things. Kansas City has grown substantially over the past 17 years. It's shocking to me that despite the airport's growth in recent years, we're not doing more air traffic than we did back then.

[earthling]

That was when we had Vangard Airlines operating as a mini-hub, so more than just local passengers counted. KC may not get a substantial enough mini-hub again unless attracting a new local startup (or of course a new terminal). There are many other better airports that can act as a mini-hub now, KCI is not at all adequate in comparison.

Mini-hubs increase flights and increase non-stop destinations. I think KCI had 80-100 non-stop destinations fluctuating when Vangard and Brannif were operating. Now it's about 50. In addition to new terminal, KCI should entice a new local startup airline like Vangard. The major airlines control mid-market transportation destinies and KC is not on their radar given crappy design for mini-hub. A local startup would help KC shape its own, which was the case with Vangard.

[pash]

.

[flyingember]

Now it's about 50.

It's 38 when you count metro areas and not airports.
You can get to Houston via two airports from KC, for example.

The count last year was over 11 million and the year-to-date numbers through May of this year put 2017 on pace for the record. flyingember's implied point, that Terminal A was closed because the airport is handling markedly fewer flights and passengers, is wrong.

No, markedly fewer gates needed. As pointed out the airlines merged and replaced the extra gates with bigger planes.

Jan 2014 to Jan 2017, the airport gained 500 civil transient (other city) flights annually. The average plane size in KC is 170 people as I recall.
It gained 104,900 total passengers. That's an average of 200 more passengers per flight on average. It means all flights are fuller than in the past.

We need more space beyond security to overflow passengers into. We need more space for baggage pickup that doesn't overlap people walking to the security line. We need dropoff/pickup that doesn't overlap in a horrible mess with the busses and garages. We need is so that a small three row Embrair short haul plane and the largest 747 can share security, not give each two lanes and one is closed because it's not shared

The airport is quickly hitting the point that it doesn't support the way the airlines want to operate.

[cityscape]

Spreading out gates, having everyone grouped for one gate that is twice as long? I bet nothing would go wrong there. Operations staff for one airline now spread twice the distance as necessary. Also, still doesn't solve the bathroom issues or the boarding problems. Good idea. Let's keep spending money on a 50 year old design that was lacking flexibility from the day it opened. Lastly, please don't equate $2.5 million in operating expenses with $1 billion in capital. $1 billion in capital could bring in additional non-ticket revenue to more than offset the cost of the capital. Opening terminal A would like result in more operating expenses without any potential to recoup it other than raising ticket prices. Read the airline's report on why they want a new terminal.

[flyingember]

Move Southwest to A, use half of the gates in each holding pen. Now you have twice as much room per flight: magic! What aspect of my vast ignorance of airline operations accounts for my failure to understand why this is impossible?

Remember, the goal is to keep or improve convenience, not make it worse. Making most people walk further from security is why this has never been seriously considered.

It also fails to fix the dropoff problem, everyone now is trying to get out in a much smaller area leading to a huge traffic jam. Or else they get out and walk even more while outside there too.

You also have to rethink luggage movement as you're redoing all of that too above and below. Remember that luggage dropoff and gathering is outside security, so you're more talking about 1/3, 1/3, 1/3 for the terminal

[cityscape]

The more I think about your arguments Pash, the more I feel you would have supported to upgrade Kemper and not build the Sprint Center. But sadly the similar problems existed at Kemper (narrow concourses, lack of bathroom space, facility in need of upgraded infrastructure). Sprint Center was the right decision and solved a lot of problems and is paying off dividends. A new airport terminal would likely do the same.

[KCPowercat]

My citation is someone else posted it already

[GRID]

Southwest has moved into most hub airports bringing prices way down. It used to be crazy expensive to fly to MSP, Denver, Detroit etc. Now it’s mostly the lower tier airports (which KCI has become) that are more expensive to fly into. KCI is now more like OKC, Omaha, Des Moines etc with just enough flights to service the local population (very few connecting flights) and not enough competition to keep prices lower. And while KC does generally have non-stops to most major cities, nearly all flights that are not Southwest run through nearby hubs of DFW, Chicago, Denver etc. KC has very few flights per day to most major cities outside interior hubs. This is mostly due to Southwest pulling back and not expanding there when KC could easily be one of the biggest hubs for Southwest (even if Southwest doesn’t technically have hubs).

There is no reason other than the terminal situation that Southwest could not have well over 100 flights per day out of KCI serving more cities with much higher frequency. Having 90 gates spread across three terminals is not the answer. KCI only needs 35-45 gates. KCI is nothing but gates. Common space, concourse space, baggage claim space, TSA space, is all way too low. That’s the problem.

[GRID]

The point on the separated people movement and tiered parking means you pay for convenience and speed makes sense. And that connects to another holy grail of our airport. Rail and how to pay for it.

One thing pointed out is space for a train will be built into the plan (could make great to downtown bus dropoff space until then)

I'm certain moving people back and forth to parking via bus is a big expense today. Why can't we combine this with getting downtown and share the cost of a rail line? You replace the expense of the airport busses with helping pay for rail operations all together. Basically use it as a revenue stream.

Another thing that we know didn't work out is to move the terminal closer. Why can't we move parking closer to downtown? Move cheap long-term parking to Amity and 152 at a train stop between Zona Rosa and the airport. Now it's 5 miles closer from downtown via I-29 and 7 miles closer to JoCo via 435. So the convenience factor went up, you park closer, hop on a ride all the same and it's just a new mode.

I don’t see the numbers ever working to support rail to KCI. The density along that 15-20 miles between KCI and downtown is just not there and probably never will be there. The vast majority of people that use KCI will always drive to it because very few of KCI’s users originate from Downtown. The entire city of KCMO is only about 18% of its users. I-29 is not congested at all and Downtown has become a much smaller part of the metro area’s workforce. KC now has one of the smallest percent of downtown workers of any major city. If you are gong to spend a couple billion on transit, there are far better places it should be spent in metro KC like the urban core and the I-70 or I-35 corridors.

However, an express coach bus to KCI would be much much cheaper and would actually be far more convenient to use for far more people. There should be hourly coach bus service direct from KCI to the Plaza with a few stops north of the river such as Zona Rosa, a major park and ride at 72nd or 64th and Briarcliff. Then local service on Main or Broadway from the river market to the plaza. That would work great for commuters, business travelers and KCI users.

You can’t really combine regional transit with local people moving issues at KCI. Trains would need to run every few minutes. Moving people around an airport is about frequency and access. Light rail, streetcar etc won’t work for that especially if it’s part of a regional line. A few buses to the long term parking is not a big deal. I’m not sure if the new terminal would include rental cars, but I would be extremely surprised if KCI is planning to vacate the rental car facility. KCI’s rental car facility is actually the nicest thing about KCI despite its offsite location. A rental car facility on the first two levels of a garage across from the terminal would be much more ideal. Those work so well and if they have the room, it's the way to go, and would be especially nice in KC’s climate. But KCI has already built the rental car facility and it was a pretty big expense to just walk away from.

I agree with moving the terminal closer. They should put in on the south side of the E/W runway. But that would require hundreds of millions of dollars in infrastructure improvements on the airport (including tunnels) and on city and state roads and highways to build up access to the south side of the airport which nobody has the money for. Airlines are not going to pay for that. I personally think you get what you pay for though and that's what the airport and city/state should do, but we all know infrastructure is not well funded in KC or Missouri.

[earthling]

On the 'hubs increase ticket prices' comment. That's only when there is a dominant hub taking most gates. A mini-hub provides a good balance of more destinations/flights but not taking so many gates preventing competition. When Vangard operated at KCI, there were still many different airlines operating and fares were very low.

[KCFan]

KCI's Director of Aviation Pat Klein is the one that said Southwest declined to move to terminal A and said they wanted a new terminal. If you think that's inaccurate, take it up with him, but I have reason to suspect he's talked with Southwest a time or two.

KCI has a max configuration of 60 gates across 3 terminals (not 90). Not sure where the 90 gate fantasy originated, but it's wrong. One of KCI's terminals has 17 and the other 18 right now (4 are unused). So even if A was operational, we're probably looking at a max of 53 gates. But as is, there's available gates right now in B & C if a new airline comes to town or if an existing one wants to expand.