dzflyer

There is no room in the gate areas in T2 and T3....terminal 5 way better....lax in general is old and outdated

18sas

This graphic is just one of the proposals, but I don't think is currently the favored alternative.

The proposal in this diagram is to turn the parking decks in the center of the U into the passenger terminals and the current terminals 1,2 and 3 would be replaced with a linear terminal a la DTW.

readywhenyouare

I hope this doesn't happen. Western Airlines did a really nice job designing T5 and used quality materials. Whatever DL would do with a new terminal at LAX would probably make McDonalds look like an upscale establishment. Look no further than the ultra utilitarian look of JFK T4.

bennos

I think I speak for most travelers when I say if LAX T5 were magically replaced overnight and looked instead like JFK T4, it would be an improvement. There is little to nothing about T5 worth keeping, except the relatively short walk to the exit.

readywhenyouare

At least T5 has nice marble and other design characteristics. JFK T4 is soulless and has no character at all. I think you are the only person I've seen with a positive opinion of JFK T4. You must really love long walks through the airport.

beckoa

Wirelessly posted (beckoa's BB: Mozilla/5.0 (BlackBerry; U; BlackBerry 9810; en-US) AppleWebKit/534.11+ (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/7.1.0.694 Mobile Safari/534.11+)

This would be hugely ironic (IMO) if DL got squeezed into T3, AS' old hangout

There is stuff in there original to TWA! (well, most of it )

KDCAflyer

I actually really like JFK T4. Yes the walks are longish, but I could use the exercise anyway.

I like the clean, utilitarian feeling. I appreciate all of the space, and the terminal amenities are quite nice.

A JFK T4 type setup would be an infinite improvement over LAX T5. IAD concourse C/D is my least favorite airport terminal in the US, but LAX T5 is definitely a close second.

ATOBTTR

Using the website walkjogrun.net, one can see that the hike from the security checkpoint to the furthest point in B at JFK is just over 0.6 miles The A Concourse at ATL - A1 to A34 is 0.44 miles and has no moving sidewalks to help you along. The hike from the central security checkpoint to the furthest point in DTW is just over 0.5 miles. Even if you take the tram in MSP, the walk from the furthest A gate to the last F gate is around 0.6 miles. From the furthest B gates DL uses at SLC to the E gate waiting area is also over a half mile. AA at ORD can have over a half mile walk - UA can have up to 3/4 of a mile. AA at CLT can have you hiking up to almost 3/4 of a mile going from the end of B to the last E gate.

So I don't get why JFK gets a bad rap for "long walks" when plenty of airports have walks that are of equal or longer length, and some of those don't even have moving sidewalks to help out (I don't mind long walks anyway - I figure I'm sitting on a plane long enough - a little walk doesn't hurt).

flyerCO

From 5pm to 11pm there's a shuttle from T5 to TBIT airside. For anything earlier though you do have to exit and re-clear security.

MAH4546

It's been in the works for a while. AA, DL and LAWA all agreed to an agreement in principal a few months ago.

When Delta leaves T5, AA takes over the entire 13-gate terminal, giving up it's nine Eagle gates (the Eagle's Nest will probably be destroyed) and likely it's four T6 gates. AA likely won't gain gates from this move. It will however, gain three gates shortly in the form of four TBIT gates, two new T4 narrowbody gates (made possible because international ops are moving to TBIT, so they can squeeze in two more gates due to less need for widebodies) and a dedicated domestic TBIT gate.

FWAAA

Agreed. That proposal dates back to former LA Mayor Hahn (Alternative D) and is extremely unlikely to ever be built. Along with the destruction of the parking garages and the single linear terminal to replace 1-3, passengers would check-in at a remote facility a mile away and then transit to the terminals on a sterile tram. Odds of that ever happening? Probably zero.

It's already a done deal. It's happening. The sooner, the better, as it will permit AA to board its 76-seaters at a regular terminal (like Delta does) instead of a mile away at the remote Eagle terminal.

ND76

The last time I checked, they took the McDonald's out from underneath the SkyClub. If it reopened, it must have been in T6.

You'd think they'd want to get something good like In n Out Burger; however, I'm guessing that since they don't franchise, they would be incompatible with the airport concessionaire.

jrkmsp

This makes sense. So, let's summarize what's involved here.

T2: 12 gates
T3: 11 gates
T5: 13 gates
T6: 4 gates from AA and 3 gates from DL
Eagle's Nest: 9 gates
TBIT: 4 gates for AA
Midfield Satellite Phase I: 11 gates

So DL gives up 16 gates in T5/T6 and picks up up to 23 gates at T2/3 — of course, they won't get all of those. They do get a new, modern terminal, presumably an airside connection to TBIT in order to facilitate connections with SkyTeam carriers and they can collocate with three of their JV partners.

So, we'll say they keep 19 of the gates at the new T2/T3, but also have to accomodate AM, WS, VA and VS out of that pool.

Aeromexico operates about 10x or 11x daily, so that's 1.5 gates, but we'll round up to 2 because they expect to grow under a DL JV.

VS operates 2x daily, so that's .25 gates.

VA operates 2x daily, so that's .25 gates.

Let's throw WestJet in there (something of a DL partner), 5x daily. That's a gate.

Let's keep Virgin America there, because of the other Virgins, 30x daily. That's four gates.

Now who has to move? AC flies 8x daily and needs 1.5 gates somewhere. Let's put them in T6.

Avianca flies 4x daily and needs half a gate. We'll pair them with AC in T6.

(This puts both of the Star Alliance airlines not in TBIT next to UA to facilitate connections.)

Hawaiian flies 6x daily and needs a gate. We'll put them in T6 as well.

Volaris flies about 6x daily. We'll call that a gate. And we'll put them at T6 as well.

Allegiant flies an average of 5x daily, but given their weird swings, we'll call that a gates at T6.

(That fills up the AA gates.)

Sun Country flies about 1x daily and needs a fraction of a gate. We'll put them in T6.

Boutique Air flies about 1x daily. We'll put them with Sun Country.

(We'll leave the last extra T6 gate for Alaska and overflow and in case Delta doesn't have 3 full gates on T6, which I'm not sure they do.)

That leaves us with Spirit, Frontier and JetBlue

Spirit flies an average of 13x daily in 2015, but is growing, so we'll give them 3 gates on the new Midfield Concourse.

Frontier flies 4x daily, but is adding less than daily destinations in 2016. So we'll give them a gate.

JetBlue flies 13x daily, but is growing. We'll give them 3 gates as well.

The leaves 4 open gates on the midfield concourse for growth.

AA takes over T5, but vacates the Eagle's Nest and T6. That gives LAX the extra gates it needs for midfield concourse, but also is a net neutral gate transaction for a much simpler operation, operating out of three terminals that are all walkable, instead of five that are spread out.

Of course, you can rearrange the non-DL, non-AA airlines as you like. But it's interesting to envision.

MSPeconomist

I don't care about making things better for some AA flights at LAX. What I do not want to happen is for DL to share a terminal/TSA security checkpoints with budget carriers. Budget airlines tend to create a mess with long lines and lots of people overflowing from gates, thereby crowding the concourses.

I like the current setup at LAX with DL having its own terminal plus a few gates in the next (airside connected) terminal where there's the AS lounge. AFAIK the AS lounge still accepts PP, so it's a good alternative to the LAX SC for me.

For connections to/from TBIT, I'd rather walk landside than be forced onto a shuttle bus.

My worst experience ever at LAX was arriving into T5 from HND, deplaning as usual with a jetway, and being forced to walk down lots and lots of stairs to buses over to TBIT for immigration and customs.

exwannabe

But does the project entail a complete reconstruction (bulldozers) of T3 or not?

If not, it sucks..

If it does, then I assume they need the MSC-N complex open to provide the 11 gates while T3 is rebuilt.

And if so, are we talking 2022 or so?