Denver International Airport Expansion Projected

Reconfigured terminal, readiness for rail and new hotel are on DIA's wish list

Back in the winter of 1995, I departed for (I think) Honduras from Denver's Stapleton International Airport and returned home several days later flying into the newly opened Denver International Airport. That was more than 14 years ago, but people still sometimes call DIA "the new airport." Since then DIA has added a sixth runway, at 16,000 North America's longest commercial precision-instrument runway, which in allows fully loaded jumbo jet to take off at Denver's mile-high elevation even during the summer. With more than 52 million passengers, it is the world's 10th-busiest airport. It has only closed twice because of exceptionally heavy snows, once in March 2003 and again in December 2006.

There have, however, been some missing elements for a modern world-class airport, notably a hotel right at the terminal and a railroad station or lightrail station for intermodal connections. The Denver City Council has been presented with redesign plans that could include remaking the "Great Hall," as I just learned the main terminal under signature white Teflon tented roof is call, so that it is after rather than before TSA checkpoints. Designers recognize that snaking lines of passengers waiting to be screened is not the best use of this grandiose space. Also included would be a FasTracks train station at the airport, rail bridges for the route into the airport and a new Westin hotel adjacent to the terminal.

The price tag? It could be a billion buckaroos or so, some of which would theoretically be paid for from revenues and recaptured from increased business generated by shops and restaurants in the main terminal that connecting passengers could access without have to go through security again. The timetable? Who knows?

I don't know whether any or all of this will come to pass, but an exciting side note is that Santiago Calatrava, an award-winning Spanish architect, is on the "DIA makeover team." He is a European architectural superstar who has designed transportation projects around the world. I have seen two of them, one in Manchester, England, and the other in Barcelona, Spain (above right). I hope we'll have a chance to see his work at DIA.