Charlotte-Douglas Airport (CLT) Expansion

[tozmervo]

I really needed that to end with a boss battle

[dubone]

You have to repeat the video a few dozens of times till you good enough for the boss level.

 

 

Then the General Assembly Airport Commission comes down from the sky and starts trying to trample all the new sections and you have to battle it back.   

 

 

 

 

 

______________________

 

This is really cool.  I had always assumed they'd keep the old roadway for the terminal expansion, but regardless, it is fun to see how it will work and the phases of construction.  It almost deserves the dramatic music with such a drastic improvement of the airport. 

[CltFlyer]

Excited for the future!  Was really hoping for at least a better designed international terminal instead of just an "extended" concourse A though.

What is the time line for the roadway/ main terminal expansion?

Edited May 4, 2015 by CltFlyer

[ssh214]

Can I just say how happy I am that they are connecting the Concourse A Anex to the actual Terminal itself, that will go a long way towards keeping the airport a simple airport to navigate through by passengers... Although I do hope they have a good moving sidewalk plan cause that looks really long...

 

I'm very surprised that they didn't highlight the new control tower they are planning... at 367 feet that will be in the top 10 tallest towers in the world

Edited May 4, 2015 by saamh

[Midwoodian]

Does anyone know if the design plans for the rebuilt roadway are being created to "accept" and integrate a future light rail the airport?

I think it would be very shortsighted not to design the new roadway to incorporate such future plans...

[ChessieCat]

Does anyone know if the design plans for the rebuilt roadway are being created to "accept" and integrate a future light rail the airport?

I think it would be very shortsighted not to design the new roadway to incorporate such future plans...

 

If I'm not mistaken there is space in the bowels of the terminal for a future underground LRT station.  

[HopHead]

Perhaps a dumb question, but does anyone in the know about construction understand why it will take ~2 years to build the expanded roadways for the arrival and departures? The timelines on the expanded terminal obviously makes sense, but the amount of time it takes to build a the roadways is perplexing to me. 

[kermit]

If I'm not mistaken there is space in the bowels of the terminal for a future underground LRT station.

I had thought the long range plans were for an LRT stop on the edge of airport property which would connect to the terminal via a seperate people mover system. My memory of this is very fuzzy since no one seems to be thinking about airport rail execpt us.

[ajfunder]

A light rail station could be built roughly where the control tower (if they are still planning to relocate it) is now and the route out of the airport would be in-between the two daily decks. This corridor was originally meant for a people mover to the parking decks but I have not seen recent plans for that project.

[tozmervo]

I think this was the general gist of the original people-mover plan. Someone correct me if this is wrong. (Map is from the wilson group website, markups are mine)

 

 

(Notably this plan is already invalid in several ways, including that Business Valet deck 2 is oriented in the wrong direction)

Edited May 5, 2015 by tozmervo

[dubone]

As long as there are travelators/moving sidewalks from the terminal to where ever the transit station is, it will be no big deal.   The older decks have a gap between them and I suspect (but not sure) the new deck has a corridor for people walking to the older decks.

 

I'm sure the new airport master plan will have some update on a long term transit connector.

 

 

With Charlotte's airport being so close to the CBD, it both has less urgency to add transit since a simple bus shuttle can get you to the CBD in 25 mins.   But it also means that it is really not THAT expensive to build a permanent transit corridor, especially with a railroad corridor running directly between the two.  

[teeg]

Perhaps a dumb question, but does anyone in the know about construction understand why it will take ~2 years to build the expanded roadways for the arrival and departures? The timelines on the expanded terminal obviously makes sense, but the amount of time it takes to build a the roadways is perplexing to me. 

I am absolutely not in the know, but from the video it seems that they gave some thought to the idea that locals might want to still use the airport during the construction.  At every point, it looks like there will be passenger drop off/pick up, the ability to walk to/from hourly, etc.  Makes more sense to me than what they did when they replaced Hourly (i.e. rip the old structure out on day 1, force hourly parkers to Daily, no pedestrian path from any of the lots), but I have to imagine that it's going to take longer.

[allthingsplanes]

^ This is my guess too.  This is an absolute logistical nightmare.  Not only do they need to maintain traffic for the departures and arrivals all moving through during construction, but they're obviously going to still accommodate pedestrians moving to and from the hourly deck.  If they were building something new on an empty site it likely wouldn't take them this long.  Plus, it's not just a roadway - it's essentially a huge bridge that will support hundreds of vehicles and people at one time.

[tozmervo]

It appears there's quite a bit of below-grade infrastructure going in, too, before the new road deck goes up.

[dubone]

It is basically a wide bridge that they're building.   Why would it not take 2y?   They may not need the whole time for active construction, but it doesn't seem even remotely like a long time to me, especially seeing the choreographing of it all to keep the current operations flowing. 

[HopHead]

I assumed it would be a logistical challenge given the volume of passengers being picked up and dropped off, especially during peak hours. But still didn't think it would take 2+ years since they could certainly schedule around that some.. However, if they are doing below grade infrastructure work, then that makes more sense. 

[uptownliving]

Yes they will be putting in 2 tunnels for pedestrians to walk from Baggage Claim to Rental Car Center and not have to deal with crossing 8 lanes of traffic.

[Deleted.]

http://www.charlotteobserver.com/news/local/article20539254.html

That's good news, shame about international though.

[seth0423]

I might seem a little bit crazy here, but wouldn't a Commuter Rail link to the airport and beyond make some sense? We could operate airport shuttles every 25-35 minutes during peak times. It would only be 5.5 miles into Gateway Station (if it ever gets built for crying out loud), and around 7.5 if you'd take it all the way up to the Amshack on North Tryon. It would be the cheaper alternative to a Light rail link because it could just run over the NS track...

[ajfunder]

NS would make the city build a third track if the frequency was 25-30 minutes. Light rail paralleling the NS mainline wouldn't be much more expensive if a whole new track had to be built.

[Miesian Corners]

I might seem a little bit crazy here, but wouldn't a Commuter Rail link to the airport and beyond make some sense? We could operate airport shuttles every 25-35 minutes during peak times. It would only be 5.5 miles into Gateway Station (if it ever gets built for crying out loud), and around 7.5 if you'd take it all the way up to the Amshack on North Tryon. It would be the cheaper alternative to a Light rail link because it could just run over the NS track...

Why not have the trains that currently terminate at the Amshack simply make one more stop at the airport? 

[cltbwimob]

United is purportedly going to restart flights from Charlotte to Denver starting in September.

 

***Edit- Did a random search for flights on UAL's website.  The flights are loaded into the system, and will be flown using an ERJ-175.***

Edited May 10, 2015 by cltbwimob

[Deleted.]

United is purportedly going to restart flights from Charlotte to Denver starting in September.

You beat me by a few minutes! By the looks of it, the service will be 2x daily, it'll be interesting what equipment they use. RDU also gets a flight to DEN on United.

EDIT- Now I see that you edited you post, and that it'll be on an ERJ-175, that seems to be a long flight for an E-Jet

Edited May 10, 2015 by Piedmont767

[CLTaviation13]

You beat me by a few minutes! By the looks of it, the service will be 2x daily, it'll be interesting what equipment they use. RDU also gets a flight to DEN on United.

EDIT- Now I see that you edited you post, and that it'll be on an ERJ-175, that seems to be a long flight for an E-Jet

Not really to be honest.

I rather it be an E175 than a CRJ700 which UA does on DEN-ATL.

If AC has an E190 flight from Toronto to PDX which is a little over 4 hours, CLT-DEN isn't bad at all. From personal experience, I'd take a E175 over a 737 any day.

Edited May 10, 2015 by JetBlueCLT

[ssh214]

Not really to be honest.

I rather it be an E175 than a CRJ700 which UA does on DEN-ATL.

If AC has an E190 flight from Toronto to PDX which is a little over 4 hours, CLT-DEN isn't bad at all. From personal experience, I'd take a E175 over a 737 any day.

Agree 100%... The E175 is the best regional jet IMO