Denver offers pilot project for Palmdale

Editorial Focus: Despite interminable delays, Denver International Airport will open Tuesday. With the nation's air passenger count expected to double within the next 18 years, the pressure is building rapidly to expand Palmdale Regional Airport to relieve LAX's grossly overcrowded conditions.

The grand opening of the nation's newest big-time airport has been delayed for the past 16 months largely because of a malfunctioning automated baggage system. Cost of the delay has been put at $1 billion.

The shiny new mile-high field is supposed to be the best-designed airport that $4.9 billion can buy. It has dozens of amenities not found at any other airport in the world and should become a groundbreaking pilot project for the future Palmdale Regional Airport.

Last year, U.S. airlines flew 515 million passengers and that annual count is expected to rise to about 815 million in the next decade - a 58% increase. With Los Angeles International Airport expected to climb from 51 million annual passengers in 1994 to more than 66 million travelers in the year 2000, the need to move forward on Palmdale's facilities is becoming more and more imperative.

A federal report issued this past week said a major expansion of U.S. airports is urgently needed to handle an expected doubling of passenger traffic in less than 20 years.

Immediate action will be needed to avoid increasing delays, according to the report. The Federal Aviation Administration's Aviation Capacity Enhancement Plan anticipates a doubling of passenger travel in the next 18 years.

This year, air traffic is up between 3% and 6% at various airports, the FAA noted. And most large airports are already operating at "close to capacity, especially at peak hours," said Monte R. Belger, the FAA's associate administrator for air traffic services.

"We will clearly need additional runway capacity, whether in new airports or additional runways at existing airports," he said.

Airport capacity is going to be the limiting factor on growth in air travel, Belger said, and his office is focusing on where new facilities will be needed most and how to get the resources to them.

Belger said his office is studying ways to assist local governments in planning and expanding their airports and in finding new ways to finance this work, including seeking private investors.

In 1993, 23 airports across the country each experienced at least 20,000 hours of flight delays at an average cost per plane of $1,600 for each hour of delay, the FAA reported.

Without increases in capacity, the number of airports experiencing 20,000 hours of delays will grow to 32 by 2003, the report said, with only Denver's old Stapleton Field expected to drop off the list.

The new Denver airport took 21 years from conception to fruition, but even that's not as long as the Palmdale Regional Airport, which has had a gestation period of 27 years and is still a long way from becoming a major multi-airline facility.

The challenges in designing an airport are enormous. They must accommodate huge, wide-bodied jets, parents with infants, people in wheelchairs, and an ever-expanding population of elderly seniors.

Ground access from the parking lot to the plane can be a torturous example of the loneliness of a longdistance runner.

Even with people-movers, the lengths some people have to go to catch a flight are exhausting and debilitating.

(Our recent experience in Miami Airport involved vigorous pursuit of a cart-pushing skycap through more than a half-mile of corridors and elevators just to get to the check-in counter.)

Denver designed its people movers to be 1 1/2 times faster and 1 1/2 times wider than other airports.

It's claimed that people need not walk farther than 750 feet from the terminal to any of its 13,000 parking spaces.

The longest distance from ticket counter to a gate is about 450 yards - a relatively short hike by airport standards - but nonetheless 4 1/2 football fields in length, which would have presented a significant challenge to a hurdleleaping O.J. Simpson, even before arthritis set in.

When Denver first tested its vaunted, highly computerized automated baggage handling beltway system, the monster reacted by tossing bags onto the floor like a mad, bad stevedore.

Many more problems will have to be dealt with as DIA swings into operation but as the first major airport to be built in 21 years, Denver International Airport should serve as a performing pilot project for the design of Palmdale Airport - whenever that great day Comes.