Charlotte-Douglas Airport (CLT) Expansion

[Temeteron]

11 minutes ago, LKN704 said:

I think the larger issue is the lack of circulation space and the congested corridors that, coupled with the low ceilings, give the allusion of a greater distance.

FWIW, I had a transfer in early 2020 at the then brand-new Istanbul Airport, which has the largest terminal in the world. The terminal layout somewhat reminds me of that of Charlotte.  Anyways, there are no trams, shuttles, or people movers at the airport...only moving walkways connecting each of the concourses. But because the terminal is so airy and spacious, and because I wasn't sent down a crowded corridor with people who act like they have never walked in public before (see CLT Concourse B and C), distances really didn't seem to be a problem. 

Lol I know exactly what you mean as I’ve been to Istanbul airport also.  Yeah I can never understand why so many airports have low ceiling.  It’s painful

[PuppiesandKittens]

Why is there no Amtrak station at the Charlotte airport?  The Amtrak line runs right through the airport land.  Couldn’t the Piedmont trains run to the airport and then reverse direction and head back uptown?

Edited to add: Improved mobility, and better connections between airports and ground transportation, are generally good things.

Edited May 20, 2022 by PuppiesandKittens

[15895]

Because the airport is shut down at 4am? Or the ridiculous time it departs to Atlanta, lol. 

Edited May 20, 2022 by AirNostrumMAD

[kermit]

3 hours ago, PuppiesandKittens said:

Why is there no Amtrak station at the Charlotte airport?  The Amtrak line runs right through the airport land.  Couldn’t the Piedmont trains run to the airport and then reverse direction and head back uptown?

Edited to add: Improved mobility, and better connections between airports and ground transportation, are generally good things.

Because the tracks between the uptown and the airport belong to NS and they are not interested in more passenger trains on those tracks without $$$$$. The last thing they want is to clog up their fancy new intermodal hub with signal delays from more passenger trains.

NS might say OK if a new track was built. Its about 5 miles from the new passenger equipment storage yard to the airport. It might cost $60-$80 million per mile. So airport rail would cost well north of $300 million (plus a station) for 4-5 trains per day. That kind of money could be much better used elsewhere IMO. 

 

[PuppiesandKittens]

1 hour ago, kermit said:

Because the tracks between the uptown and the airport belong to NS and they are not interested in more passenger trains on those tracks without $$$$$. The last thing they want is to clog up their fancy new intermodal hub with signal delays from more passenger trains.

NS might say OK if a new track was built. Its about 5 miles from the new passenger equipment storage yard to the airport. It might cost $60-$80 million per mile. So airport rail would cost well north of $300 million (plus a station) for 4-5 trains per day. That kind of money could be much better used elsewhere IMO. 

 

Thanks.  Federal and state money helped pay for the Norfolk Southern intermodal center that is on airport grounds: http://www.nscorp.com/content/nscorp/en/news/norfolk-southernsnewcharlotteregionalintermodalfacilitywillsuppo.html

Even before the intermodal center was built, the Charlotte-Atlanta line has been a Federally-designated high-speed rail corridor (I’m not joking), and the Obama-era rail grants were used to upgrade the Norfolk Southern lines around Charlotte, for the benefit of passenger trains and freight trains. The Charlotte-Atlanta line is also proposed (by Amtrak) to be used for multiple new passenger trains (but we’ll see how far that gets).

Surely with all of the Federal and state funds that Norfolk Southern received for the airport intermodal center and for track work elsewhere around Charlotte and NC generally, a new airport station could have been thrown into the mix without Norfolk Southern extracting hundreds of millions of dollars for it. 

Why wasn’t that done: did government simply not think of it?

I’m not blaming Norfolk Southern; it’s a freight railroad that has the right to control its property.  But I do blame government: it sounds like someone dropped the ball on this.

[kermit]

20 hours ago, PuppiesandKittens said:

Thanks.  Federal and state money helped pay for the Norfolk Southern intermodal center that is on airport grounds: http://www.nscorp.com/content/nscorp/en/news/norfolk-southernsnewcharlotteregionalintermodalfacilitywillsuppo.html

Even before the intermodal center was built, the Charlotte-Atlanta line has been a Federally-designated high-speed rail corridor (I’m not joking), and the Obama-era rail grants were used to upgrade the Norfolk Southern lines around Charlotte, for the benefit of passenger trains and freight trains. The Charlotte-Atlanta line is also proposed (by Amtrak) to be used for multiple new passenger trains (but we’ll see how far that gets).

Surely with all of the Federal and state funds that Norfolk Southern received for the airport intermodal center and for track work elsewhere around Charlotte and NC generally, a new airport station could have been thrown into the mix without Norfolk Southern extracting hundreds of millions of dollars for it. 

Why wasn’t that done: did government simply not think of it?

I’m not blaming Norfolk Southern; it’s a freight railroad that has the right to control its property.  But I do blame government: it sounds like someone dropped the ball on this.

All true, although I'll nit pick two things. First, the Obama era grants paid to upgrade NCRR lines around Charlotte, not lines that NS owns so the state was willing to contribute. Second, while there were federal contributions to the intermodal yard were of the "here is money so you can take trucks off of I-85" variety (that is what the grant program was developed for). The city did get something important in trade for the airport land: the new service yard for the BLE was the old NS intermodal yard.   I do agree that the state and federal government are really bad at gaining concessions from freight railroads when passing out grants to them -- they are somewhat better about getting those concessions when RRs merge.

Should Amtrak decide it wants to put a ton of cash into the NS Atlanta-Charlotte tracks per their new route plan then the CLT station will certainly be a part of that. Unfortunately I am not optimistic Amtrak will do that. Spending billions on the tracks would still result in incredibly slow Atlanta service and the greenfield HSR route is just real enough to discourage most government funders from spending money on existing (always slow) tracks. We might see one additional Atlanta train in the short term, but that would not result in a new station.

EDIT: The other possibility for a CLT heavy rails station is related to the funding of the S-Line rebuild (something I think is nearly certain from the infrastructure bill). The S-Line will allow for phase 1 of the SEHSR plan to be nearly complete -- the only incomplete segment of Phase 1 will be the CLT airport station. So... if NCDOT writes the planning grant (due in September) to include the Gateway station to airport segment then it could happen in the next few years. It all depends on how ambitious NCDOT is with its proposal. (FWIW NCDOT really wishes it had more ambition when it applied for the Obama era ARRA grants, it really looked like they could have gotten multiples of what they asked for)

Edited May 21, 2022 by kermit

[RANYC]

My business travel has cranked up again.  LaGuardia airport is gleaming and stunning now, and Charlotte airport concourses are fast becoming a version of the old LaGuardia.  A low-ceilinged cattle pen brimming with frustration and with an audio system that barely conveys anything.

[xapostrophe]

17 hours ago, RANYC said:

My business travel has cranked up again.  LaGuardia airport is gleaming and stunning now, and Charlotte airport concourses are fast becoming a version of the old LaGuardia.  A low-ceilinged cattle pen brimming with frustration and with an audio system that barely conveys anything.

$8 billion terminal renovation/new construction in the most populous city in the US.    Roughly 30 million passengers a year up there.  It's not really a good comparison.  Though I agree that the new terminals in LGA are outstanding. Really beautiful and open and large.  The new terminals CLT is building are like $600 million a shot.

[videtur quam contuor]

I came through the completed LGA with American in February and it was a LONG, LONG walk to the taxi stand and no moving sidewalks. 

[PuppiesandKittens]

27 minutes ago, xapostrophe said:

$8 billion terminal renovation/new construction in the most populous city in the US.    Roughly 30 million passengers a year up there.  It's not really a good comparison.  Though I agree that the new terminals in LGA are outstanding. Really beautiful and open and large.  The new terminals CLT is building are like $600 million a shot.

If anything, the comparison between CLT and LGA makes CLT look far worse than what’s posted above.  The PANYNJ- which in my view can’t do anything right- totally rebuilt a very busy working airport in a high-cost, high-traffic, densely-populated area without closing the airport and without disrupting flights.

CLT has lots of space, low costs and only one major tenant (American) so making it usable and modern should be far easier.  That CLT is a way overcrowded and outdated facility is disgraceful.

 

[BarrenLucidity]

LGA spent $8 billion on their revamp and, last I checked, CLT is spending $3.1 billion for "Destination CLT" through 2035. The new spaces will be better but E will still be E. 

Edited May 22, 2022 by BarrenLucidity

[TCLT]

1 hour ago, PuppiesandKittens said:

If anything, the comparison between CLT and LGA makes CLT look far worse than what’s posted above.  The PANYNJ- which in my view can’t do anything right- totally rebuilt a very busy working airport in a high-cost, high-traffic, densely-populated area without closing the airport and without disrupting flights.

CLT has lots of space, low costs and only one major tenant (American) so making it usable and modern should be far easier.  That CLT is a way overcrowded and outdated facility is disgraceful.

 

The construction project very much disrupted flights and vehicle traffic. Airlines reduced their schedules during the construction and had to shuffle their operations around as construction moved around the airfield. The roads approaching the terminal were often a total nightmare too. But while painful, the disruption to the airlines wasn't catastrophic by any means. The terminal B rebuild at LGA didn't affect the airport's largest airline and hub operation (Delta in C & D who are doing their own impressive but less ambitious renovation). AA is the largest operator at terminal B and operates about 150 daily departures, sometimes less depending on the day. The LGA operation is not integral to the overall airline network, the operation isn't particularly profitable for AA, and the gate utilization is not very high. AA serves about 15,000 passenger per day (of which 80% are local). AA also had the option of serving those local customers from JFK and EWR from which they also have significant operations. Connections over LGA can easily be duplicated over PHL, DCA, and JFK.

Compare that to CLT where AA operates 600-700 daily departures for up to 70,000 daily passengers (of which 80% are connecting), and among the highest gate utilization in AA's network. There's far far smaller margin for disruption at CLT and when CLT does get disrupted it ripples and cascades throughout the entirety of AA's network. Wiping out 5-10 gates at a time would be unthinkable for AA, which I'm sure is why the B and C expansions are getting done after A North Phase II. The current Delta gates that AA will pick up on A will back-fill gates lost as they work through phases of B and C. This should allow AA to more or less maintain their schedule until they get the new gates on the completed B and C bump outs to use for expansion. CLT is a high volume, high utilization connecting operation that's super sensitive to costs and operational disruptions and there is no backup infrastructure that can do what it does for AA. Having low costs and only one major tenant also makes it hard for the airport to force large expensive capital projects because all the costs get borne by that one tenant and they represent a larger cost increase than a similar amount would starting from a higher cost base. I'd argue that upgrading CLT (especially in a way that AA is willing to pay for) is far harder than doing the same for LGA. CLT, like the metro region as a whole, competes primarily on cost, not on quality. I can't see that changing any time soon.

[PuppiesandKittens]

36 minutes ago, TCLT said:

The construction project very much disrupted flights and vehicle traffic. Airlines reduced their schedules during the construction and had to shuffle their operations around as construction moved around the airfield. The roads approaching the terminal were often a total nightmare too. But while painful, the disruption to the airlines wasn't catastrophic by any means. The terminal B rebuild at LGA didn't affect the airport's largest airline and hub operation (Delta in C & D who are doing their own impressive but less ambitious renovation). AA is the largest operator at terminal B and operates about 150 daily departures, sometimes less depending on the day. The LGA operation is not integral to the overall airline network, the operation isn't particularly profitable for AA, and the gate utilization is not very high. AA serves about 15,000 passenger per day (of which 80% are local). AA also had the option of serving those local customers from JFK and EWR from which they also have significant operations. Connections over LGA can easily be duplicated over PHL, DCA, and JFK.

Compare that to CLT where AA operates 600-700 daily departures for up to 70,000 daily passengers (of which 80% are connecting), and among the highest gate utilization in AA's network. There's far far smaller margin for disruption at CLT and when CLT does get disrupted it ripples and cascades throughout the entirety of AA's network. Wiping out 5-10 gates at a time would be unthinkable for AA, which I'm sure is why the B and C expansions are getting done after A North Phase II. The current Delta gates that AA will pick up on A will back-fill gates lost as they work through phases of B and C. This should allow AA to more or less maintain their schedule until they get the new gates on the completed B and C bump outs to use for expansion. CLT is a high volume, high utilization connecting operation that's super sensitive to costs and operational disruptions and there is no backup infrastructure that can do what it does for AA. Having low costs and only one major tenant also makes it hard for the airport to force large expensive capital projects because all the costs get borne by that one tenant and they represent a larger cost increase than a similar amount would starting from a higher cost base. I'd argue that upgrading CLT (especially in a way that AA is willing to pay for) is far harder than doing the same for LGA. CLT, like the metro region as a whole, competes primarily on cost, not on quality. I can't see that changing any time soon.

I flew out of LGA about once a month during the reconstruction of terminal B and fly either to or from LGA every week (since last year).

Any reduction in flights was not particularly noticeable.

 

[TCLT]

2 minutes ago, PuppiesandKittens said:

Any reduction in flights was not particularly noticeable.

Exactly.

[PuppiesandKittens]

9 minutes ago, TCLT said:

Exactly.

And my point in my post is that CLT has so much available land that it could add a new terminal or new gates much more easily than LGA did, since CLT could just add onto the current airport, while LGA had to demolish and rebuild at the same time.  
 

Also, since CLT has much lower costs than LGA, it has room to raise fees payable by airlines, to fund construction.  

 

And since a higher portion of CLT’s traffic is connecting traffic (more of LGA’s traffic is O&D), effects on airport roads would have less of an impact on CLT.  

 

In short, updating CLT should be much easier than updating LGA was, and if the PANYJ (widely viewed as incompetent and corrupt) can successfully rebuild LGA, CLT can definitely be improved.

Edited May 22, 2022 by PuppiesandKittens

[TCLT]

7 minutes ago, PuppiesandKittens said:

And my point in my post is that CLT has so much available land that it could add a new terminal or new gates much more easily than LGA did, since CLT could just add onto the current airport, while LGA had to demolish and rebuild at the same time.

More expensive and more risky than adding  a handful of gates at a time. CLT's plan is expand as the passengers come to avoid overbuilding and overspending. May be overly conservative but it makes sense for an airport that overwhelming relies on connecting traffic.
 

7 minutes ago, PuppiesandKittens said:

Also, since CLT has much lower costs than LGA, it has room to raise fees payable by airlines, to fund construction.

It is doing that with Destination CLT. But pushing too far undermines CLT's entire competitive advantage.

 

8 minutes ago, PuppiesandKittens said:

And since a higher portion of CLT’s traffic is connecting traffic (more of LGA’s traffic is O&D), effects on airport roads would have less of an impact on CLT.

Connecting traffic is more sensitive to price, more susceptible to competition, and much easier to more through other hubs. If airport costs cause AA to raise fares at CLT, those pax can and will fly Delta through ATL or United through IAD or Southwest through STL or Spirit or whatever airline can offer a similar enough itinerary for cheaper. Or if AA just doesn't want to pay the increased costs they just draw down flights and reroute pax through DFW or DCA or wherever and leave CLT with the bill for the unused facilities.

 

CLT has to strike a pretty fine balance between maintaining decent enough facilities to be competitive enough with passengers while keeping the low costs that keeps the third largest airline hub at the airport allowing the region to punch way way way above economic weight. 

[PuppiesandKittens]

1 hour ago, TCLT said:

More expensive and more risky than adding  a handful of gates at a time. CLT's plan is expand as the passengers come to avoid overbuilding and overspending. May be overly conservative but it makes sense for an airport that overwhelming relies on connecting traffic.
 

It is doing that with Destination CLT. But pushing too far undermines CLT's entire competitive advantage.

 

Connecting traffic is more sensitive to price, more susceptible to competition, and much easier to more through other hubs. If airport costs cause AA to raise fares at CLT, those pax can and will fly Delta through ATL or United through IAD or Southwest through STL or Spirit or whatever airline can offer a similar enough itinerary for cheaper. Or if AA just doesn't want to pay the increased costs they just draw down flights and reroute pax through DFW or DCA or wherever and leave CLT with the bill for the unused facilities.

 

CLT has to strike a pretty fine balance between maintaining decent enough facilities to be competitive enough with passengers while keeping the low costs that keeps the third largest airline hub at the airport allowing the region to punch way way way above economic weight. 

Thanks.  Good points and thanks for explaining.  
 

DCA just expanded and is hemmed in by other developments, so I don’t think that AA can move all of CLT to DCA, so hopefully CLT has enough power to raise costs enough to make the airport better.  It’s better than LGA was a few years ago; CLT is just way too crowded.

[CLT2014]

Airports like DFW, PHL, and CLT are very captive to the quality of renovations American Airlines is willing to pay for / cover via increased fees. American knows airports like DFW, PHL, and CLT are all about connections and scale and need to keep operating costs low. If that fundamental dynamic shifts too much, I guarantee routes like CLT - Dublin go bye bye. It only exists for connections and if that cost incentive is gone... AA will just shift those routes to Chicago, Philadelphia, Miami, Dallas, NY, et... Passengers pick a connecting hub largely based off price, schedules, and geographic convenience and AA knows this. We are also a major hub for an airline that has tended to have a strategy of ripping out in flight entertainment off planes, packing more economy seats in with less legroom, installing the smallest bathrooms possible, removing dividers between first class and economy, et.... the quality of the renovations thus represent the quality of the airline that is the main tenant paying the bills. Also, AA is in the worst debt position of the big 3 airlines.... so their capital investments at airports looks different than Delta.

At airports like LGA and LAX, AA is spending SIGNIFICANTLY more on renovations to win over local based travelers in metro areas that are more populated than 45 of the US states. They are competing against airlines like Delta and United who are also renovating their terminals at those airports and it becomes a fierce battle to have the most luxurious terminal to win frequent flier loyalty in these metro areas of 15+ million people with lots of mass affluence. I honestly think AA would have been happy to keep those airports as dumps if it meant lower costs, but competitors are forcing them to invest. Even at Chicago, AA has been publicly upset about the costs of the new terminals, but because they directly compete against United... have to renovate their terminals as well to stay competitive. If they were the sole airline at Chicago... they would have forced the airport authority into less ambitious renovations.

Unsurprisingly, the renovations at CLT aren't that different in quality than the renovations at the older terminals at DFW. American Airlines had a heavy hand in decision making for renovations at both of these airports. 

DFW renovations in partnership with AA at their largest hub (looks familiar right, even down to the floor?)

 

Philadelphia got an even WORSE renovation deal than CLT with American Airlines. Concourse B renovations included some paint, artwork, and incorporating new restaurants. Floors, dark canned lighting, the drop tiled ceiling, et... remain unchanged. Below is American's "proud" investment in Philadelphia.

 

The renovations in Concourse B and C at CLT were exactly what AA was willing to do.... they didn't want to reduce their flight schedule for a more high quality hub operation in their concourses.  They were absolutely not going to spend $5 billion+ to replace their 80+ gates at CLT with entirely new terminals. I think the quality of the new new A terminals and the headhouse being built reflects what CLT is capable of... but the state of B and C definitely reflects what the tenant, American, was willing to do. Even DFW, as AA's main hub and headquarters, got a light resurfacing renovation for older concourses. 

Edited May 23, 2022 by CLT2014

[davidclt]

1 hour ago, CLT2014 said:

Airports like DFW, PHL, and CLT are very captive to the quality of renovations American Airlines is willing to pay for / cover via increased fees. American knows airports like DFW, PHL, and CLT are all about connections and scale and need to keep operating costs low.

At airports like LGA and LAX, AA is spending SIGNIFICANTLY more on renovations to win over local based travelers in metro areas that are more populated than 45 of the US states.

Philadelphia got an even WORSE renovation deal than CLT with American Airlines.

The renovations in Concourse B and C at CLT were exactly what AA was willing to do.... they didn't want to reduce their flight schedule for a more high quality hub operation in their concourses.

Does anyone remember when American was the best airline flying America's skies? How the mighty have fallen. From: AQR Report Card – Airline Quality Rating (wichita.edu)

Rank

Year

2021

’20

’19

’18

’17

’16

’15

’14

’13

’12

’11

’10

’09

’08

’07

’06

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1

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VX

VX

FL

FL

HA

HA

FL

HA

B6

B6

B6

US

AS

DL

WN

US

DL

WN

WN

AA

WN

2

HA

G4

HA

B6

DL

DL

B6

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B6

B6

HA

HA

FL

FL

B6

B6

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FL

AS

AS

US

AS

CO

CO

CO

AA

AA

WN

AA

3

DL

DL

WN

WN

B6

VX

DL

DL

HA

FL

B6

B6

B6

B6

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DH

WN

WN

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NW

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AA

US

UA

UA

UA

UA

4

G4

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B6

HA

B6

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5

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9E

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[CLT2014]

^ American is just an operating name now. Modern day American Airlines is really US Airways doing business as AA. The leadership team of American largely came from America West Airlines that bought US Airways that bought American so the pre-2013 quality rankings of AA would largely be US and HP. Pre-2013 AA died after the merger. 

Current day American's CEO, CFO, COO, and EVP Strategy ALL were leaders at little low cost carrier America West in Phoenix back in the 90's... who orchestrated  gobbling up US Airways (and tried to make it a low cost carrier) and then they jumped on the opportunity to take over American and pushed out all of pre-2013 AA's leadership. Unsurprisingly... they operate modern and global American rather similarly to the strategy they had running a low cost carrier in Arizona that viewed the customer as extremely price conscious. Their heart and experience as leaders was operating a low cost carrier and I think the product that is modern-day AA is reflective of its weird confusion as a premium mainline carrier that is also trying to compete against Spirit, Frontier, Southwest, et... like America West back in the 90's. 

Edited May 23, 2022 by CLT2014

[LKN704]

3 hours ago, CLT2014 said:

^ American is just an operating name now. Modern day American Airlines is really US Airways doing business as AA. The leadership team of American largely came from America West Airlines that bought US Airways that bought American so the pre-2013 quality rankings of AA would largely be US and HP. Pre-2013 AA died after the merger. 

Current day American's CEO, CFO, COO, and EVP Strategy ALL were leaders at little low cost carrier America West in Phoenix back in the 90's... who orchestrated  gobbling up US Airways (and tried to make it a low cost carrier) and then they jumped on the opportunity to take over American and pushed out all of pre-2013 AA's leadership. Unsurprisingly... they operate modern and global American rather similarly to the strategy they had running a low cost carrier in Arizona that viewed the customer as extremely price conscious. Their heart and experience as leaders was operating a low cost carrier and I think the product that is modern-day AA is reflective of its weird confusion as a premium mainline carrier that is also trying to compete against Spirit, Frontier, Southwest, et... like America West back in the 90's. 

While everything you are saying is accurate in regards to HP running US,  I don't get the narrative that AA was some type of premium, holy grail-like carrier domestically in the 1990s/2000s that is often given to them. 

I actually thought they were the worst carrier (I recall Northwest being pretty bad, too) domestically at the time, way behind the likes of US Airways and United.

AA's planes were nasty and bare-bones compared to the competition...they would fly MD80s (without entertainment systems, this is pre-WiFi) on extremely long segments, like Chicago/Los Angeles, whereas US/UA had video entertainment on essentially all flights longer than 3 hours. I remember being in awe at how modern and "fancy" US Airways' Airbus fleet was upon delivery...it was the first time I saw in-seat power outlets in Economy (little power ports in the armrest that required an adapter). 

Their inflight service was equally bad, whereas United would do a full hot meal service with metal utensils in Economy on shorter flights (~3 hours), AA just gave out bagged lunches at the gate (the Bistro Bags). US Airways was also generous with their meal service at the time, giving out hot meals in Economy on Northeast/Florida segments whereas you were lucky if you got the sandwich bag on AA. I also recall AA's crew to be pretty arrogant as well, they all seemed to have this "rah-rah we are the best" attitude. 

[Reverie39]

All I can say about this stuff is that it's sort of surprising when you compare the physical size/number of gates between Douglas and some other airports. It looks almost the exact same from above (Google Earth) as BWI airport, despite being MASSIVELY busier. Like, twice as much passenger traffic. I have only flown through Douglas a few times but to me really any sort of size/gate expansion is welcome and sorely needed for such a bustling airport.

[LKN704]

23 minutes ago, Reverie39 said:

All I can say about this stuff is that it's sort of surprising when you compare the physical size/number of gates between Douglas and some other airports. It looks almost the exact same from above (Google Earth) as BWI airport, despite being MASSIVELY busier. Like, twice as much passenger traffic. I have only flown through Douglas a few times but to me really any sort of size/gate expansion is welcome and sorely needed for such a bustling airport.

BWI is a little bit different than CLT (it's quite similar to MIA) in that not all concourses are connected airside, although I believe that is the final plan for the airport. 

BWI actually has more mainline gates at present (73) than does CLT (69). If you combine the extra gates with the fewer flights/day (compared to CLT), fewer passengers/day, and the wider/more open infrastructure (Pier A, Pier D, and Pier E especially) overall, BWI will always feel less congested and is actually one of the more underrated airports in the country IMO in terms of physical infrastructure and experience. Part of that is historical, as it was built to be a major hub...it used to be a decently sized US Airways hub back in the day, and then was a hub for both AirTran and Southwest through the early 2000s. 

CLT actually reminds me of Amsterdam Schiphol, although I think Schiphol has more gates than CLT. 

[Hushpuppy321]

It’s this expansion plan/graphics still valid anymore for the planned expansions up to 2035/2040?

[JRCLT]

It’s this expansion plan/graphics still valid anymore for the planned expansions up to 2035/2040?
http://content.invisioncic.com/x329420/monthly_2022_05/41C9567E-BD10-4C46-A99D-7D840D84AE76.thumb.jpeg.e9bb16f59346bc99313edf40aa3aa9c0.jpeg

Yes and no. Some of those things are outdated (Ex. Doesn’t depict the concourse E expansion) but some are still planned for. I wouldn’t say it is a perfect indication of where the airport is heading. Generally speaking it is somewhat the aim. Expansion of most concourses and addition of the longer parallel runway at the bottom and likely a fifth runway addition at the top there. Other facility and runway improvements may differ now than that image. Things may have shifted and changed a bit. This one may be more accurate, though things are constantly changing/adjusted at the airport.