KCRag Forum

This is pretty great news for future air travel expansion...SWA can't wait to explode here.

Yeah. Looks like Terminal B is going to have to come down ASAP.

KCPowercat wrote:This is pretty great news for future air travel expansion...SWA can't wait to explode here.

This city is taking off. Just need a European nonstop, streetcar expansion, a DT stadium and WC games.

Run down of what's happened:

KCI Pax Growth is double what was projected in 2013.
SWA and KCAD announced today that the new terminal will be 39-42 gates expandable to 50.
This will,push back financial close and opening.

beautyfromashes wrote:

KCPowercat wrote:This is pretty great news for future air travel expansion...SWA can't wait to explode here.

This city is taking off. Just need a European nonstop, streetcar expansion, a DT stadium and WC games.

2 of those are very close to happening.

the pushback of financial close is a small price to pay for building a right sized airport.

In the session today did they talk at all about the size of the parking garage being too big / small?

KCPowercat wrote:the pushback of financial close is a small price to pay for building a right sized airport.

In the session today did they talk at all about the size of the parking garage being too big / small?

I couldn't listen closely, but it was on their list of assumptions to revalidate. So they're aware of it, for what that's worth.

The proposals all listed a 6,500 spot garage.

yeah I saw it on the presentation and plan on watching a rebroadcast to see if they address it at all....and if they mention what assumptions they used to validate the # of spaces (future private car use vs. rideshare, putting any rental cars in the garage, etc)

KCPowercat wrote:yeah I saw it on the presentation and plan on watching a rebroadcast to see if they address it at all....and if they mention what assumptions they used to validate the # of spaces (future private car use vs. rideshare, putting any rental cars in the garage, etc)

Is the rebroadcast up? I tried to scan youtube, but I can never quite figure out how they archive.

I don't know...I actually didn't know they were on youtube, I just try to catch it on channel 2 or go to kcmo.gov and see if it's there.

ldai_phs wrote: KCI Pax Growth is double what was projected in 2013.

SWA and KCAD announced today that the new terminal will be 39-42 gates expandable to 50.

Expandable to 50? I feel like that's awfully short sighted. What's the benefit of a new airport if it opens at it's max capacity, and soon thereafter hits it's maximum capacity that it can expand to? A: We're back at square one. Building another entire terminal. With a different company. And different design. All the makings for a horrible airport experience for passengers. Build something ONE time and get it right. It's not that hard.

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ldai_phs wrote:

im2kull wrote:

ldai_phs wrote: KCI Pax Growth is double what was projected in 2013.

SWA and KCAD announced today that the new terminal will be 39-42 gates expandable to 50.


Expandable to 50? I feel like that's awfully short sighted. What's the benefit of a new airport if it opens at it's max capacity, and soon thereafter hits it's maximum capacity that it can expand to? A: We're back at square one. Building another entire terminal. With a different company. And different design. All the makings for a horrible airport experience for passengers. Build something ONE time and get it right. It's not that hard.

The opening day terminal will likely have a few city gates. These are gates not leased out to airlines but are instead payed for on a per use basis. This leaves space for the current and new airlines to expand into. Basically every airport has these. So that's like 2-5 gates of built in buffer. 50 gates won't be needed for 10+ years at the current growth rate. Building that excess would be a complete wast of funds at this point. Additionally, I think this Terminal could probably be expanded to 55-65 gates if we really needed too. Remember that ~27 gates are leased today, and the new terminal allows for much greater capacity (and flights per day) per gate.

It was mentioned at a public meeting that moving the control tower would allow the single terminal to be expanded more vs having to build a second one in the far future. .
If you ever been up the tower you know it's straight out of the 70's. Hopefully we can get the FAA to replace ours soon. Maybe we need Graves or such to push for it?

We'll know pretty quickly how serious the airlines are about expanding by how fast they get rid of terminal B.

I trust the architects here. They know what they're doing.

Planning for a larger expnasion project and more initial gates doesn't indic8ate we are opening a terminal in 2022 at full capacity...whomever is suggesting that is being silly

KCPowercat wrote:Planning for a larger expnasion project and more initial gates doesn't indic8ate we are opening a terminal in 2022 at full capacity...whomever is suggesting that is being silly

Right. I watched the presentation. They said they are going to build 39 so that they have excess capacity upon opening.

B terminal is planned to be torn after completion of construction. Once B-terminal is gone, they have an option to expand to 42 gates without affecting existing operations of the new terminal. They put a 15-20 year time horizon on that if at all needed.

The whole conversation around 50 gates was to make sure there is maximum flexibility in the future to ensure future council's/airlines are not constrained by our decisions today. Basically, they do not see us EVER needing to expand to 50 gates, but, they are not ruling it out and so are going to design that possibility into today's build. The whole discussion is around providing maximum flexibility 50 years from now, not that we need 50 gates 5 years from now.

kboish wrote:
The whole conversation around 50 gates was to make sure there is maximum flexibility in the future to ensure future council's/airlines are not constrained by our decisions today. Basically, they do not see us EVER needing to expand to 50 gates, but, they are not ruling it out and so are going to design that possibility into today's build. The whole discussion is around providing maximum flexibility 50 years from now, not that we need 50 gates 5 years from now.

You're way under estimating how compound math works

4% compounded growth is a doubling of passenger numbers in 18 years. Something has to grow if that keeps up. And we know the more direct flights, the more airplanes will need a gate at once.

I would expect your "not needed in 50 years" ends up being more like "60 gates in 25 years"
39 gates is going to be more about financing, not long-term needs. They're trying to build in a way they know will expanded on.

Nope. I understand how compound math works. You’re making assumptions based off incomplete information. Did you watch the presentation?

They literally said 4% growth is not sustainable, do not anticipate that to continue over the long term, and understand there will likely be a recession at some point that will cause a drop in passengers.

I’m not stating what I think. I’m relaying what they said.

Just listened to presentation. Loar drives me nuts.

If anyone has a link, please share.