First, the standard disclosure whenever I write about airport expansion issues (which is not often, these days). For six years, I worked as an organizer, researcher, writer and media relations specialist for a coalition of twelve municipalities affected by flight operations at O'Hare Airport. They sought to prevent new runways and were pushing for a south suburban "green grass" airport instead. I did similar work for one year in Seattle.

Runway back-ups, safety and dysfunctional airport planning in the Chicago region are serious issues, and have been for some time.

Here's the Trib's story (free reg. req.). It's based on some pretty solid reporting, so I'm going to cite a number of key points:

...Chicago's plan to reconfigure O'Hare, the most complex and expensive airport expansion project in U.S. history, is layered with uncertainties. A Tribune analysis of thousands of pages of airport and FAA documents raises questions about how many years of relief the expanded airport will provide before debilitating delays return, whether a huge jump in the number of planes taxiing across runways will jeopardize safety and what the project's ultimate cost will be.

...FAA documents...warn that major flight delays could return just five years after the city finishes reconfiguring the runways. Nevertheless, the FAA is expected to approve this week the most ambitious part of the city's expansion, a plan. The FAA's decision will allow Chicago to start razing homes and businesses in Elk Grove Village and Bensenville immediately and to dig up a religious cemetery established near fruit orchards 55 years before the Wright brothers' first powered flight.

BTW, when they mention "orchards?" That's for real. The "ORD" on your luggage tag stands for "Orchard Place," an old designation for one of the communities that, as the Trib notes, long preceded the airport.

Surely, the economic benefits of O'Hare have been heroic, and not denied by any.

But the 1800s German immigrant roots of the Bensenville community to the field's immediate southwest (an area I covered as a community newspaper reporter from 1983 to 1988, before joining up with suburban mayors pushing for an alternative to O'Hare expansion) are deep, and rich. As The Trib's brief allusion to the cemetery angle indicates.

All the same, in classic Chicago fashion, the fix is in. Dig up and relocate the dead, they're not Native Americans, after all, so, What The Hey! And full speed ahead on the doomed expansion, even if the airlines aren't on board.

....Buoyed by strong support from the Chicago business community, Mayor Richard Daley's administration repeatedly has rejected calls from the airlines and air-traffic controllers to build the project differently and at a lower cost. "The city says we are partners in all this, but we have no input," said Bill Hood, managing director of corporate affairs in Chicago at American Airlines. American, United and the air-traffic controllers support expanding O'Hare but prefer to leave much of the existing airfield intact, adding just one new runway and extending another. to untangle O'Hare's intersecting runways with a network of parallel ones. This would allow 100 landings and 100 takeoffs hourly in bad weather, they say, far more than can be done currently.

The city's runway plan poses considerable safety risks, as well.

...the city's plan would tear up most of the airfield, removing three runways, building four new ones and extending two others. Following the current trend of airport development, the city plan envisions parallel runways. Under the city's proposal, planes would taxi across runways more than 2,100 times per day, increasing the risk of collisions caused by miscommunication. Today, planes typically cross O'Hare runways about 100 times daily, air-traffic controllers and the FAA's operations manager at O'Hare said.

Some planes would taxi for as much as 5 miles—more than double today's taxiing distance—adding time and fuel costs. "They will regret that they built it this way," said Craig Burzych, president of the O'Hare Tower National Air Traffic Controllers Association. Air-traffic controllers, who work shoulder-to-shoulder in one tower today, would be split up between two towers on different sides of the airport.

Pilots taxiing to terminals after landing on the new runways at the fringes of the expanded airport would be required to switch radio frequencies as many as five times before arriving at their gate. A missed radio call could lead to a plane going astray, creating an accident risk. Today, one radio channel is used in most cases. City officials said the runway layout is safe, and the FAA agrees, noting that controllers will slow down takeoffs and landings to prevent mishaps. But Chicago's predictions of reduced delays don't take this into account.

Despite today's airline financial problems and rising fuel costs, there are strong economic forces driving creation of new airport capacity and added flights through major hub regions such as Chicago, Atlanta and Dallas.

The FAA projects that increased demand for air travel at O'Hare could reach 1.4 million annual flights, up from 974,000 today. That increased traffic would spark a return to the kinds of lengthy delays that the massive expansion is trying to fix just five years after the runways are complete, according to FAA documents.

"In the world of airport development, there is no denying that if demand increases, eventually you find yourself back where you started," said Barry Cooper, a top FAA official who is reviewing the city's expansion plan. "It's a matter of investing in how many years of better performance you are looking to get."

At this point, the City of Chicago has decisively won the regional political battle for grand expansion of O'Hare, as opposed to a more modest approach which might yield better results. Chicago City Hall, of course, excels at politics, if not ethics. The city's Aviation Department, which oversees day-to-day operation of the airport (apart from controllers) is a hub of political cronyism and patronage. Perhaps, as this project becomes mired in the inevitable cost overruns, scandals and O'Hare-sized inefficiencies, the plate will be set for some future Chicago mayor to get it right on regional airport system planning. One can dream, at least. One of the more prominent, "recent" expansion projects at O'Hare included this (1980s vintage) United Airlines terminal promenade (left), replete with people mover, multi-colored flashing lights, and piped-in ambient muzique. This over-reaching, "world-class city" display, showcases Helmut Jahn's visionary design. And the government-abetted cultural permeation of an hallucinogenic sensibility.

As it happens, the long-proposed ex-urban airport south of Chicago may be moving toward construction. The state is refining its recommendations, including a judicious 20,000-acre footprint, and just one runway to start. The FAA is expected to decide on the project by next year. In a revealing break from Chicago City Hall's opposition to the new airport, State Senate Majority Leader Debbie Halvorsen (D-Crete) continues efforts to get it built. Opponents, meanwhile, are appealing to Willie Nelson for help. Surely a promising sign.

In the meantime, if you don't have to make a connection to London or Singapore, Chicago's small Midway Airport - on the city's southwest side - is a great, low-hassle alternative to O'Hare.

TECHNORATI TAGS: O'HARE EXPANSION, CHICAGO

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Posted by Matt Rosenberg at September 25, 2005 11:46 AM