There was a big dog-and-pony show at Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport last week touting American’s growth. This didn’t sound like much to me until I saw the details. Holy cow. American is turning on the jets with a massive number of new gates at DFW in the not-so-distant future.
You may recall the previous DFW growth plan which was announced in 2023. Terminals A and C would each get new stubby piers which would add 5 and 4 net new gates respectively. Those were dedicated to American. Then there was the new 15-gate Terminal F which was going to be built as cheaply and annoyingly as possible.
Terminal F v1.0 would have no headhouse (ticketing/baggage claim) and no parking. It was just a rectangle built at the edge of the current footprint. This was rumored to be for Southwest, Frontier, and some of the cats and dogs in Terminal E today, presumably opening a little more space for American somewhere in E.
Here is how I expected it would look back then:
But now, it’s a whole new ballgame. American will still get those 9 gates in Terminals A and C, but Terminal F has been put on steroids with a total of 31 gates coming online. And all of those will go to American.
Here’s how I think the new design will look:
As you can see, this now creates a real headhouse which will have ticketing and baggage functions. It will be connected to Terminal D via a walkway, and it will have international-capable gates, expanding the airport’s customs/immigration processing capability.
The Skylink station will be on the hypotenuse of that left corner triangle which creates easy access into the gates for connections from other terminals. It may look like the track disappears in that image, but the Skylink actually runs on top of part of the new addition and airplanes will taxi under it at some point. Here’s a rendering from American Airlines and DFW:
It looks to me like the existing gates D1/2/3/4 will now just flow right into the new terminal. That’s great news for locals who get stuck flying out of those gates today, because it is one long walk from the rest of the D gates.
As you can tell, this design will be very different than the rest of the airport. It’s half a normal semi-circle, but it has gates on both sides instead of a roadway and parking as in the other terminals so it is a far more efficient use of space. This allows American to put a lot more gates in a smaller footprint — it will have the same number of gates as A does after that 5-gate addition is built — but the design does create other issues. Most importantly: how do you even get there if you’re not connecting?
This is where that new rectangular parking garage comes into play. Right now, that area is just an empty field, but you can see in that rendering that it will become a large parking structure. According to the release, this garage will have a “built-in curbside circulation and an innovative baggage drop and check-in area to maintain the quick access to check in and security that customers have come to expect.”
American clarified that this will be where people get dropped off since F v2.0 won’t have the big curbside of the other terminals, but then people will walk across the footbridge and into the terminal where baggage and ticketing will be.
This doesn’t come cheap. The original Terminal F build was supposed to come in at $1.63 billion. It’s now going to be about $4 billion with this added scope.
Is it worth it? Of course it is. DFW is American’s bread-and-butter. It has an enormous, profitable hub there which it wants to keep growing. By the time this is done, Delta’s Atlanta hub might look tiny. I never thought we’d see the day.
Put it this way. As of now according to Cirium data, DFW is scheduled to have 919 departures per day on average in July. Delta in Atlanta? It has 902 daily scheduled. Now, Delta does have much bigger airplanes flying — it averages 160 seats per departure in Atlanta while American has 136 — but just think about how many more departures American can run through DFW with all those new gates. It is going to be the biggest single airline hub in the world.
The key question for me now is exactly how many new gates American will get. We know for sure that American gets the 9 new gates in A and C as a net increase with no loss elsewhere. But if American is getting the full 31 gates in F, it is going to have to give back something. A DFW spokesperson told me “…DFW airport will receive back gates currently operated by American Airlines to be used in the future for other airlines.”
I couldn’t get any more detail on that, but the obvious assumption is that it will give some at least some of the gates it has in E today and presumably some space in D as well since it can do international flying at F. But how many gates will go back? We don’t know. What is clear is that it will be a big net gain, and I’d be surprised if it was anything less than a couple dozen net new gates in the end. The first ones start coming online in 2027, so get ready for growth.
54 comments on “American Turbocharges DFW Growth with Terminal F Takeover”
Cranky,
Please explain how the cost could be so high for a Wal-Mart styled terminal?
The United States sucks, absolutely sucks, at infrastructure. It’s more expensive here than most other places in the world. But you’re right, it should not cost anything like the quote.
Someone is getting incredibly rich off of this.
Grift. And remember, this price being quoted is pre tariff.
Angry Bob – Beats me. We can’t seem to build anything cheaply in the US.
I’m not sure what the “Wal-Mart” reference is supposed to mean here.
There are lots of reasons for escalating costs of infrastructure projects, but nothing about this project says Wal Mart. It’s not like they are proposing a big warehouse with some jetbridges attached.
Wal-Mart = the average big box store that is built on the cheep & is expected to last 20-years or less before replacement.
Hypotenuse’ means the third leg of a right triangle.
Let me be more specific: how is this proposed project a Wal-Mart?
Is it just because it’s not following DFW’s already horrendously outdated design concept of parking as close as possible to your gate?
Alex B – I assumed this was in reference to the $1.63b initial plan which was quite literally a box.
Yes, exactly.
Ah, got it.
I’m just trying to figure out what ‘hypotenuse’ means
The hypotenuse is the side of a right triangle (a triangle where one of the corners is at a 90 degree angle) that’s opposite the 90 degree corner.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Right_triangle
SEA is looking to replace its south satellite and its going to be over $2B. It’s not growing, just a replacement.
The question, as always, is who’s paying for what?
The answer, as usual, will be the public. But how??? Revenue bonds, increased passenger facility use fees, increased cost per emplanenent?
One wonders if Southwest is floating around the mix here.
I think as long as Elliott is driving the train probably not. They want money out RIGHT NOW, and they are not really concerned with future growth.
Too bad because with how they are constrained at Love (fixed at 20 gates) they could establish more there.
I don’t think AA needs any help getting things done at DFW.
Southwest may be more interested in expanding their Dallas market by building up McKinney than jumping into the fray at DFW.
The city is stating they expect the passenger terminal should be ready by July 2026, and they’d expect route announcements around six months before that.
I’m not entirely clear on how big the terminal will initially be – one source says three gates initially, expandable to five easily, while Wikipedia’s source is saying they initially expect three to five flights a day. The Wikipedia source is behind a paywall (Dallas Morning News), here’s the 3-5 gates source:
https://communityimpact.com/dallas-fort-worth/mckinney/government/2025/03/25/mckinney-airport-expansion-project-gets-524m-in-funding-commitments/#:~:text=Work%20on%20the%20airport%20expansion,late%202026%2C%20the%20release%20states.
I suspect the Wikipedia entry is wrong and the editor conflated “gates” with “flights”.
If this becomes part of Southwest’s strategy for the Metroplex, it’ll be interesting to see if any other city steps up. Fort Worth Alliance or Meacham spring to mind. (Although I’d hope it was Meacham, or that funding on the project would be contingent on Alliance dropping the “Perot Field” name. Seriously, Fort Worth, Ross bloody Perot?)
I doubt Southwest ever moves into Fort Worth because:
1) McKinney’s catchment area may be less populous for now but the Collin County market is more lucrative than Fort Worth and will likely grow at a faster rate.
2) Alliance’s catchment area in north Tarrant county was principally built up because of its proximity to DFW, so there’s little marginal benefit associated with a second passenger airport.
3) Most importantly… AA is headquartered in the city of Fort Worth.
I could see some upstart low cost carrier setting up a small station at Meacham in the future… meanwhile the McKinney city council just authorized construction agreements despite popular disagreement with the airport expansion and I wouldn’t be surprised at all if Southwest had a role in that political process.
The rendering kindly omits showing the actual taxiway cutting under the train tracks – they must be proposing a substantial modification to the actual tracks themselves, because most of the existing support columns aren’t spaced widely enough for even an E175 to fit between them.
AA putting more eggs in their DFW basket. I guess they have to bolster the network in the place that makes the most financial sense to them since the northeast is a puzzle they cannot solve.
The only challenge is the risk associated with putting too much in one hub.
The challenge AA will have to solve is how to grow in non-Southeast regions. AA is very strong in the Southeast w/ MIA, DFW, and CLT. Continuing to grow Dallas from the fortress mega-hub is a smart move, but it does not have to be a choice to recover #1 at LAX and rebuild in the Northeast.
As long as Dallas continues to be one of the fastest growing MSAs in the US both economically and population wise, the potential will continue to grow. Given Austin and San Antonio have limitations in their growth due to much higher competition, their proximity to each other and Dallas and Houston, and far smaller size to ever compete vs Dallas and Houston directly, DFW’s (like IAH) catchment is quite strong. UA and AA will heavily benefit from this.
In 5-10 years DFW will overtake Chicago to become the 3rd largest metropolitan area in the US. In 15-20 years, it will be on-par with Los Angeles – sure things can change and eventually this exponential growth can slow, but the potential of a fortress hub in an MSA of that size is something that doesn’t exist to the same extent today.
In comparison, ATL which is another phenomenal hub for DL is the 9th biggest MSA if you combine the Bay Area (SF and San Jose are separate for some reason) and is growing at half of the rate of Dallas and Houston. It is also growing fast, but not crazily so (on-par w/ Miami’s growth).
In addition to San Francisco–San Jose, Washington–Baltimore should be considered a single conurbation, as they are when measured by CSA rather than MSA. Those CSAs along with Chicago edge out the Dallas–Fort Worth CSA, though as you mention the explosive growth in its suburbs is helping Dallas close the gap.
Chicago is the only one of those places with an airport hierarchy similar to Dallas. The bulk of traffic is served by a single mega hub airport and supported by a single smaller Southwest dominant airport. The difference of course is that unlike DFW, O’Hare is split between two major carriers. With United trying to wrestle AA out of O’Hare though, the airline market dynamics may not be that different between those two similarly sized CSAs in that 10–15 year time frame.
LA is a different story altogether. Its CSA population includes the Inland Empire and is over twice that of Dallas. Even with metro Dallas’s growth it won’t come close to the LA market anytime soon.
This is true – given AA’s increase in capacity at ORD and their lawsuit against losing gates (TBD), it seems they want to rebuild their presence. Regardless, AA’s opportunity at Dallas is basically DL at Atlanta but potentially even bigger – the most important CSAs in the US (pop. >5.5M):
1. NYC: ~22M (-0.4% since 2020): DL and UA have ~25% market share while AA and B6 have ~12%
2. LA: ~18.5M (-0.7% since 2020): WN, AA, DL, and UA all range between 15-20% market share overall (including LAX, Burbank, Ontario)
3. DC + Baltimore: ~10.2M (+2.0% since 2020): AA has a hub at DCA, UA at IAD which is strong international but weak domestic, and WN dominates at BWI – UA slightly leads WN and AA
4. Chicago: ~9.9M (-0.5% since 2020): UA and AA split ORD (~40% to ~25% share) with WN dominating MDW – ends up split overall in the Chicagoland (UA has ~35% share vs WN and AA’s ~20%)
5. Bay Area: ~9.2M (-0.7% since 2020): UA hub at SFO, but it’s not as dominant as one would think (~50% market share) since AA, DL, and Alaska all have strong presences. WN hubs at OAK and SJC – the end result is UA has ~40% share vs WN’s ~30% in the Bay Area
6. Dallas: ~8.9M (+9.2% since 2020): AA dominates DFW (~80% market share) while WN dominates DAL – DFW accounts for ~85% of Dallas’ market, so AA holds ~70% of the Dallas metroplex market share
7. Boston: ~8.5M (+1.7% since 2020: B6 and DL fight over Logan each with ~25% share while AA and UA have decent presences (~15% and 10% respectively)
8. Houston: ~8.0M (+8.8% since 2020): UA dominates IAH (~70% market share) while WN dominates HOU. IAH is ~75% of Houston’s market so UA holds ~50% share across Houston
9. Philadelphia: ~7.5M (+1.5% since 2020): technically this is a strong AA hub (~45% share) with a sizeable LCC presence, but EWR’s catchment overlaps with this area resulting in PHL not being as large as similar CSA airports are – PHL is more comparable to the 2nd tier DAL or HOU for WN than a DFW or IAH.
10. Atlanta: ~7.3M (+5.2% since 2020): dominant, most lucrative hub in aviation for DL (~70% share)
11. Miami: ~7.3M (+5.8% since 2020): AA has a strong hub in MIA (~60% share), but FLL is a low-cost hub for NK and B6 with DL and WN comparable. MIA accounts for ~60% of Miami’s overall traffic giving AA ~35% overall share in Miami
Looking at these CSAs, the ones that stick out are Atlanta, Dallas, and Houston. Every other CSA is a split market (or not really that sizeable like PHL). While Houston is an opportunity for UA, HOU is not as capped as DAL, and AA dominates Dallas more than UA does Houston (~70% vs ~50% share respectively).
If I were a regulator, I would look into how I could create more competition at Atlanta, Dallas, and Houston since these fortress hubs are terrible for consumers. The result would likely be creating a second large airport at Atlanta and expanding DAL or forcing more competition at DFW.
While ATL is very well laid-out for its size, both in terms of terminal layout and runway layout, the ATL metro area is huge and traffic is rough, such that crossing the ATL metro area is a pain, especially during rush hour. I’d love a second large airport at ATL (and agree that it should be built, even though ATL would probably be more convenient for the 1 flight a year I make to the area), but I just can’t see that happening barring a black swan event.
DL has the Georgia politicians in its pockets so deep it isn’t funny, along with the NIMBY crowd for any other potential airport alternatives. I think it would take some SERIOUS federal intervention (or a huge scandal involving DL and local politicians or ATL management) for another airport between Chattanooga & Columbus (GA) to have more than a few flights a day, let alone be “large” (or large-ish, similar to MDW or HOU relative to ORD & IAH).
The US doesn’t have a federally planned air transportation system – which was the whole point of deregulation.
Local governments own and operate nearly all US commercial airports.
The reason why there will not be a second commercial airport in the ATL area is the same reason why there will be no new runways built – nobody wants it in their neighborhood.
Georgia did a pretty bad job of regional transportation planning compared to other metro areas including Houston and Dallas, both of which have far more miles of highway in the metro area including multiple beltways or loop highways.
It will be very interesting to see if a new commercial airport is opened in N. Texas as some expect with the end of the Wright amendment and the follow-on legislation.
As for DFW, it is a strong hub and will be in a major growth area for the country but DL has another hub 600 miles straight up I-75 from ATL and another 500 miles to the west of DTW and another 1000 miles to the west of MSP; DL has the middle of the US covered very well other than Texas.
just as with the massive construction at ORD, the new terminal at DFW will come at costly new labor rates. DL and WN still have significant growth capacity in its existing hubs which requires little capex for terminals.
As Parker noted, the multiple terminal building setup at DFW means that AA spends more on labor than other airlines. Adding more gates to each terminal will help increase the labor efficiency but running bags between terminals at DFW is a very labor-intensive exercise.
I think there’s a possibility of a small second commercial airport somewhere in the greater Atlanta area, probably to the northeast of ATL, as growth makes the drive to ATL longer and longer. This would be similar to the McKinney airport project in the Dallas Metroplex.
The question would be whether or not that area has the income level to support such an airport. Even Islip has problems attracting more than service to Florida (with Caribbean connections), WN to its network connections at BWI, and some LTD service on Avelo and Breeze that isn’t Florida, and their catchment area has a pretty high income level and an hour-plus drive to JFK or LGA.
There have been suggestions that such an airport could also be developed in De Kalb or Cobb Counties, but that’s still really close to ATL.
Eventually there’ll be a second Atlanta-area airport, but it’ll be a pretty small one. ATL has nothing to worry about.
Craig,
it still comes down to the reality that no one wants commercial service in their airport and there have been very few states that have pushed for expansion of service to new commercial airports – because it is political suicide to do so.
There have been votes in some of the counties surrounding ATL about expanding airports in those counties and they have all failed.
Georgia didn’t even impose a single mass transportation system on the metro Atlanta area.
N. Texas didn’t bulldoze Love Field and Denver learned that lesson.
That’s not really true, Tim. There have been plenty of places in Atlanta that are open to having a second Atlanta airport in their airport but the city of Atlanta in cahoots with Delta have made sure they’re not able to do it. The corruption is honestly a bit hard to ignore.
Delta brags about these types of monopoly airports (ATL, DTW, MSP, SLC) in their investor day presentation but pleasantly ignores the money Delta spends to ensure they remain the only airports in their region, despite demand.
Delta has gone as far as creating fake “citizen groups” in the case of Paulding airport to ensure a second airport isn’t opened in the region. For other airports in the region, the city of Atlanta has ensured no second passenger commercial terminal emerges via investment. It doesn’t have much to do with citizen demand, though there are cities, no doubt, that don’t want to sponsor commercial service in the area. Many of these airports the city invests in to prevent commercialization or Delta creates these fake citizen groups to sway public opinion.
The Atlanta Journal Constitution has plenty of articles about Delta’s shenanigans in the Atlanta metro to prevent a second airport from competing with their ATL monopoly. Usually in conjunction with the city of Atlanta helping them. The same city getting corruption investigations about their profiteering from the ATL airport.
Let’s not pretend the metro area of Atlanta doesn’t want a second airport. SOME random city would love the revenue. Hell, the Braves now play about an hour from ATL in good traffic and that’s because that’s where their fans live. With respect to Atlanta, the growth in the city isn’t happening near ATL.
I think everyone understands why Delta doesn’t want a second Atlanta airport. It’s easy to tell why the city of Atlanta doesn’t want revenue going to places on the far NW of the city… but the people of the metro area? That’s not as clear-cut.
Max,
Feel free to provide evidence from a major map system that shows it takes anywhere close to one hour to get from downtown Atlanta to Truist Park. It takes nowhere near that long. It’s rush hour in Atlanta right now and the best route takes 23 minutes according to google maps.
Then look up the word “monopoly” and you will find that not one of the top 10 legacy hubs/focus cities are monopolies.
Then provide the case numbers for the voter fraud cases that have been filed against the City of Atlanta or DL regarding any second airport.
Nobody wants a commercial airport -even a small one -in their backyard.
THAT is why ATL, CLT, PHL etc STILL have one only single commercial airport.
You will find that DL conditioned signing a new 30 year contract with the City of Atlanta on there being no development of a second airport in the 10,000 acre space that the City owns in NW metro Atlanta but is NOT an airport.
DL has built ATL into the world’s largest hub because DL and EA built ATL’s current terminal complex to be a massive connecting complex and still remains the gold standard for hub airport design. DL outlasted Eastern, AirTran and Southwest’s hub efforts. DFW was built from scratch just a few years before ATL and IAH a few years before DFW and both totally failed in designing those two to be major connecting airports.
None of which changes that there has been endless federal intervention in the allocation of space and access to facilities in places like the N. Texas metroplex -but not ATL.
And DL at ATL ouboards AA’s DFW hub by double digit percentages because DL uses larger aircraft -90% mainline -which shouldn’t be hard to do when you operate nearly 1000 flights/day – which is the camp ATL and DFW are uniquely in.
I’ll let you google Paulding airport, fake delta citizen groups, city of Atlanta airport investment in non ATL airports, and overall city of Atlanta airport corruption. It’s a pretty easy google with lots of hits. Seems you don’t know about it. You’ll enjoy the reads from the last two decades.
Should be easy to find. The Atlanta journal Constitution has plenty of articles on the topic.
Per gauge at DFW vs ATL
Calm down, buddy. Not trying to measure sizes with you ;)
Not the topic either (nor is atl/delta but you love to bring delta up regardless) but, as always, I admire your attempt to change the topic to something else; per usual
Simply pointing out the city of Atlanta and delta have a long history of preventing other airports in the metro. Suggesting otherwise just isn’t reality.
This is well documented by your own local paper
there either are cases of voter fraud or real citizens cast real votes.
and if it took not having a 2nd commercial airport in a region to be successful, why is it that DL, NW and US figured it out with ATL, SLC, DTW, MSP, CLT and PHL but AA, CO and UA did not?
deregulation happened at the same time for every US airline.
None of which changes that AA and WN have spent more money and energy fighting each other over trying to wound the other than any two airlines in the history of US aviation – and the gloves all come off this year.
DFW is newer than the vast majority of US airports but is far less conducive for connections than other hubs.
AA will spend $4 billion to create a terminal complex that is more expansive for one airline than any other airline’s operation at any airport in the world and AA’s operation at DFW is behind and will continue to trail other airlines including DL’s hubs.
“and if it took not having a 2nd commercial airport in a region to be successful, why is it that DL, NW and US figured it out with ATL, SLC, DTW, MSP, CLT and PHL but AA, CO and UA did not? deregulation happened at the same time for every US airline.”
First. CLT and PHL do have competing airports. CLT’s is not huge, but has two ULCCs there, JQF.
PHL’s issues with nearby airports is quite well documented whether BWI, EWR, or even ILG’s occasional relevance.
Neither JQF or ILG provide the pricing pressure of HOU, DAL, MDW, etc but, unlike Delta’s core monopoly hubs, they exist (though I’ll happily give TOL a shout out for some degree of presence).
But are you really asking why airports that existed at deregulation: HOU, DAL, OAK, MDW, are somehow relevant to documented instances of DL creating fake citizen groups and working with the city of Atlanta to shut down any potential for a second Atlanta airport? Deregulation happened at the same time for everyone. But those airports already existed at deregulation.
and DFW airport at the time I write this is under an FAA ground delay program due to thunderstorms.
DFW has a much higher percentage of GDP programs than other southern US hubs including ATL and also more than ORD
DFW = Does Not Function (when) Wet!
Doesn’t Function Wet
Not saying you’re wrong, but what’s your source?
A study showed DFW at #9 on weather prone US airports, better than IAH (but you’re right. ATL was not on the top ten). Ground Delay programs don’t necessarily equal most impacted by weather.
https://weather.com/travel/news/2024-11-20-americas-worst-weather-airports
A nice, unexpected use of hypotenuse
Doesn’t it feel like AA should be focusing on gauge instead of gates or number of flights? Part of DL’s success in ATL is lower CASM from the higher gauge, no? Would also help some with the GDP issue Tim mentioned above (i.e. less flights = quicker IROP recovery)
Who currently uses that parking area that will be displaced? Are those employees? Or is that a Park & Ride that will move to the parking deck?
The parking area has been closed for quite some time (more than a year, if memory serves), actually, in preparation for construction of the original Terminal F design. It used to be passenger parking. Now they park a few odd buses there when they aren’t in service, but those will be easy to relocate.
The apron space is used for parking planes during the day (i.e. international flights with long sit times) and for charters (with air stairs and buses) so they’ll have to find another spot for those, but that shouldn’t be too hard. It’s a massive airfield.
Great economics, strategic growth, blah blah blah… my OCD self will never be able to fly there, or even look at the terminal map, again… because HOW COULD YOU NOT DO ANOTHER HORSESHOE?!?!? Terminal D’s boxy-ness was hard enough to swallow. There are just some things in life that need to be symmetrical, all other considerations be damned. We’re basically just turning it into another JFK.
The power of DFW is why AA hasn’t felt the need to grow ORD as much as United has had to. UA can claim they “win” ORD all day, but they don’t have a Dallas or Atlanta to back them up or a home to dominate. Instead, they have DEN and IAH which are two lesser desirable hubs for reasons of geography, population, and competition.
DFW is a great connecting point if you live south, but for large parts of country, it is too far out of the way. It’s one of the reasons I never fly AA. Denver being more central makes it a great connecting point, which seems to be the point of a hub. Also, United seems to be flexing its muscle there. Southwest has also dialed back its ambition in Denver with Elliot running the show, so UA has seen its market share grow there.
Geographically, there are other cities that make better hubs, such as DEN, MCI, STL, and ATL. However, DFW’s disadvantage isn’t that great considering it is projected to the nation’s second or third largest MSA in the next 10 years. It’s a sweet spot for AA to have.
The problem with MCI and STL is they don’t have the combination of hub and local O&D that DFW or even DEN have.
Partially a function of population size, DEN has a substantial tourist industry, and St. Louis is a relatively low-income metro area.
Yes, that’s why I said geographically. Those cities are in the best position to flow west, east, north, and south. Although some could say DFW is too south, IAH is certainly too south. That’s why IAH will never be as good as DFW.
AA with DFW and ORD have the country covered nicely from top to bottom and side to side.
Oh, and for those that can’t fly that far south, they’ve got an option on AA through ORD.
Elliott, the Eddie Lambert of airlines
The goal is to be the most profitable airline. Not sure why one needs a “home to dominate”. United has hitched its wagon to international growth, not dominating the US. While AA certainly has a desirable position at DFW, it’s outposts (Northeast and West in particular) hurt its overall profitability.
Is it better to have a dispersed hub system with huge international presences where all hubs are profitable (as Scott Kirby has stated) vs a mega profitable hub and significant laggards? Time will tell, but I don’t see how anyone can puff their chest out as a AA fanboy when it comes to current financial performance.
Why would anyone in their right mind want to connect at DFW in the summer? (or even now as Tim Dunn has pointed out)
It takes a day or two to recover after T-storms hit.
ATL isn’t exactly immune to frequent summer thunderstorms
Also, I don’t think anyone has mentioned what a PITA it will be to connect from Terminal A to the far end of new Terminal F if there’s on 1 train stop near the headhouse!
Having lived in both Dallas and Houston. I can say I can’t stand either place. But DFW is a far better airport to fly to or from than any other I’ve seen in the US. The addition sounds pricey, but there’s at least a better than even chance it will be done right.
And… totally unrelated… DFW has one of the best, if not THE best, plane watching/ aircraft spotting set-ups I’ve seen. Founders Plaza, built on the north edge of the airport was built with true aircraft geeks in mind.
My two cents on US airports…
For large airports, DFW gets my vote as one of the best/most convenient when you’re getting dropped off or picked up at the curb (not quite as great when you’re connecting, though it could be worse). For huge airports built with layouts to support efficient connections, ATL is the gold standard IMHO.
For medium-ish airports built for O&D traffic instead of connections, I really like TPA’s setup with the trams from the central hall to the satellite-style terminals. I’ve gone from wheels down on the runway (while sitting in the cheap seats of a 737) to feet on the curb in 13 minutes at TPA, which is insanely good; many airports have taxi times alone that are longer than that.
For “bad” large airports for connections, any airport that doesn’t have all of the terminals connected airside (behind security) is a pain… Looking at you, JFK (unless things have changed).
For overall airport atmosphere (no pun intended), LAS is one of the worst. Smokers, gambling, lots of noise, people working on getting (or sweating off) being boozed up, not a fun place to sit in the terminal for any length of time.
The lack of after-security movement between terminals at JFK isn’t that major of an issue – except for intra-terminal connections (mostly DL or B6), most of JFK’s connecting traffic is international, and those passengers have to re-clear security after customs anyway.
IIRC, Delta used to have post-security buses or walkways for connecting traffic back when it was spread across multiple terminals. Not sure how TWA handled it back in the day between T5 and T6.
And yes, TPA is wonderful. If I’m picking someone up at the airport, I just park in short-term above the groundside terminal for free and text them to tell them where I am, no fooling with curbside at all.