Nashville International Airport Development thread

[Neigeville2]

5 hours ago, volsfanwill said:

they are fine when people use them correctly,  it is a moving sideWALK   not a moving sideSTAND.

and, yes i get mad at people on escalators also,  they you walk up or down stairs, so you should do the same when the stairs move!

Well I have a heart condition and I'm going to stand and let the sidewalk/escalator move me.  Walk around.

[LA_TN]

On 11/17/2017 at 6:20 PM, jmtunafish said:

Hong Kong!  My 3rd home (after Cookeville and Paris).

But it's really not fair to compare BNA to HKG.  HKG has over 70 million passengers on over 100 airlines and is HQ of one of the world's (certainly Asia's) premier airlines, Cathay Pacific.  It's got 65,000 employees and is also the world's largest air cargo hub.  The HongKong government, which is flush with cash, spares no expense in making HKG quite a showplace.  HKG is also a much newer airport, having opened in 1998, just after HKG was handed back over to China.  Its previous airport, Kai Tak, was straight out of the 1950s.  Even BNA's old terminal was nicer than old Kai Tak.

In BNA's defense, the only airports where I've had to pay to use a luggage cart are in the US.  That's certainly not unique to BNA.

Still, BNA's expansion plan is much needed and way overdue.   It will never be on the level of HKG, but BNA will certainly be one of the USA's nicest airports when it's all said and done.

Everything above is 100% correct. But I just used HKG as an example while passing through. The same is true for any airport outside USA, that I have visited. Even places like Thailand have free Wi-Fi in airports with  <1 million passengers. If you are an international traveller, Wi-Fi is a necessity and becomes critical if there are any issues. And yes, other U.S. airports charge for for Wi-Fi, etc but BNA seems to be the most expensive I have seen.

Charging for Wi-Fi is just a pathetic money grab equivalent to payday loans. The ones who need it the most are hurt the most by charging for Wi-Fi

[LA_TN]

On 11/17/2017 at 11:23 PM, Neigeville2 said:

Well I have a heart condition and I'm going to stand and let the sidewalk/escalator move me.  Walk around.

Absolutely!! People movers are life savers for those in need and for those that are late (me, hehehe)!! Stand right, walk left. Easy!!!

Now, about the left lane in the interstate! Hahaha!!!

[jmtunafish]

6 hours ago, LA_TN said:

Everything above is 100% correct. But I just used HKG as an example while passing through. The same is true for any airport outside USA, that I have visited. Even places like Thailand have free Wi-Fi in airports with  <1 million passengers. If you are an international traveller, Wi-Fi is a necessity and becomes critical if there are any issues. And yes, other U.S. airports charge for for Wi-Fi, etc but BNA seems to be the most expensive I have seen.

Charging for Wi-Fi is just a pathetic money grab equivalent to payday loans. The ones who need it the most are hurt the most by charging for Wi-Fi

Agreed on all counts.  When WiFi was in its infancy it was understandable that it wasn't free.  But these days there's no excuse to charge for WiFi.

BNA's web site is a little confusing about this.  It says BNA has "free WiFi" but that it costs $9.95/month.  ??

https://www.flynashville.com/about/Pages/wifi-faqs.aspx

[bigeasy]

Every time I have flown out of there I haven't had to pay for WiFi??

[LA_TN]

4 hours ago, bigeasy said:

Every time I have flown out of there I haven't had to pay for WiFi??

30 minutes free Wi-Fi. Not very helpful if stranded at BNA. For most of us,  this is no big deal because we have AT&T, Verizon, etc; but international travelers will be 100% reliant upon Wi-Fi

[franktown]

A large portion of international travelers would also likely go to the Admirals or Sky Club where there's free wifi. Also, Boingo gives free wifi to subscribers of many international telecoms and to Amex card holders. I think bag carts are ridiculous - they aren't even offered at DFW which is far larger than BNA.  

[markhollin]

[Pdt2f]

I think that the question of who leases the new gates in concourse D is the biggest thing in my mind about this expansion. I’m wondering if they’ll piecemeal them out to different airlines or if someone swoops in and gobbles up the whole thing. 

[Hey_Hey]

The October passenger numbers were released today.  September was minimally up from the previous year (likely due to hurricanes), but October 2017 (1,310,007) is up 7.6% over October 2016 (1,217,173). For the FY, BNA is up 7.3%.

[Pdt2f]

1 hour ago, Hey_Hey said:

The October passenger numbers were released today.  September was minimally up from the previous year (likely due to hurricanes), but October 2017 (1,310,007) is up 7.6% over October 2016 (1,217,173). For the FY, BNA is up 7.3%.

Big numbers, second busiest all time, I believe. 

Edited November 29, 2017 by Pdt2f

[Binbin98]

I seriously hope that the change in management and new construction at this airport will get it on track with the rest of Nashville's growth. In my opinion whenever I travel to this airport, It feels like an airport that would be at a small to mid size city, not one of the fastest growing cities in America. Bad airports can stifle a city's growth, I hope this isn't the case with Nashville but it seems to be going down that route.

[Pdt2f]

56 minutes ago, Binbin98 said:

I seriously hope that the change in management and new construction at this airport will get it on track with the rest of Nashville's growth. In my opinion whenever I travel to this airport, It feels like an airport that would be at a small to mid size city, not one of the fastest growing cities in America. Bad airports can stifle a city's growth, I hope this isn't the case with Nashville but it seems to be going down that route.

What airline do you typically fly into bna? I know it’s not at the level of other large airports but I find concourse c (American and southwest) to be on a different level than the other concourses. It’s much wider, more comfortable seating arrangements, and more retail options. 

[NashRugger]

Well BNA is playing serious catch up because it's rare to have a mid-size airport, it technically is by definition, experience such incredible and sustained high growth like BNA has the last several years.

I can bet the airport will want a broader array of airlines for the gates at D and I really do not see any single airline swooping in and taking them all unless American were to shock everyone with a return of hub status.  I can see JetBlue and Frontier likely moving over to D if they can and potentially Spirit entering, who by the way REALLY wants in, but Southwest has done well at keeping at bay for now. If JetBlue, Frontier, & Alaska/Virgin America move to D, that could very well push Delta to make BNA at least a "focus city" like Raleigh and take the entirety of B. Hell, they have the gate space now to do it!

As I've said before, along with others, American will likely bring it more mainline aircraft and also expand some service to current cities and potentially add Phoenix to accommodate their OneWorld partner, British Airways.

[Binbin98]

55 minutes ago, NashRugger said:

Well BNA is playing serious catch up because it's rare to have a mid-size airport, it technically is by definition, experience such incredible and sustained high growth like BNA has the last several years.

I can bet the airport will want a broader array of airlines for the gates at D and I really do not see any single airline swooping in and taking them all unless American were to shock everyone with a return of hub status.  I can see JetBlue and Frontier likely moving over to D if they can and potentially Spirit entering, who by the way REALLY wants in, but Southwest has done well at keeping at bay for now. If JetBlue, Frontier, & Alaska/Virgin America move to D, that could very well push Delta to make BNA at least a "focus city" like Raleigh and take the entirety of B. Hell, they have the gate space now to do it!

As I've said before, along with others, American will likely bring it more mainline aircraft and also expand some service to current cities and potentially add Phoenix to accommodate their OneWorld partner, British Airways.

What I am saying is that usually airport growth is a bit slower than city growth in growing cities, however, Nashville's airport is so far behind in comparison to the city's skyrocketing growth that it concerns me a bit. When I was living in Nashville, I was skeptical the growth would continue until now and it has, because Nashville has a je ne se quoi (my french sucks sorry) that other cities don't seem to have in terms of the inherent quality of life here. That quality of life is hard to remove and therefore I don't see the growth stopping anytime soon, however our lackluster airport compared to other growing cities and cities in general could hamper our growth in terms of large corporate relocations and stuff like that. I am happy the airport is finally renovating itself and has a flight to London, but I feel like with Nashville's record breaking growth it may feel constrained after the construction is done as well. I've never really heard or seen a city outpace its airport and transportation by so much so it is interesting to see. I just get a sinking feeling Nashville in the future could end up with a Phoenix-like airport, which is considerably less connected and smaller than the economic footprint and size of the city, and only has like 1 or 2 transatlantic flights despite it being in the top 15 largest metro areas in the country.

 

Also as of next year I will be flying in on British Airways which will be fun for me  this is something I am not complaining about. 

Edited November 29, 2017 by Binbin98

[e-dub]

7 hours ago, NashRugger said:

Well BNA is playing serious catch up because it's rare to have a mid-size airport, it technically is by definition, experience such incredible and sustained high growth like BNA has the last several years.

I can bet the airport will want a broader array of airlines for the gates at D and I really do not see any single airline swooping in and taking them all unless American were to shock everyone with a return of hub status.  I can see JetBlue and Frontier likely moving over to D if they can and potentially Spirit entering, who by the way REALLY wants in, but Southwest has done well at keeping at bay for now. If JetBlue, Frontier, & Alaska/Virgin America move to D, that could very well push Delta to make BNA at least a "focus city" like Raleigh and take the entirety of B. Hell, they have the gate space now to do it!

As I've said before, along with others, American will likely bring it more mainline aircraft and also expand some service to current cities and potentially add Phoenix to accommodate their OneWorld partner, British Airways.

i thought we already were?

 

http://news.delta.com/delta-designs-first-kaboom-playground-nashville

[wmaddbb2018]

1 may be completely wrong about this, but in my travels it seems like many other cities of a similar size have so much more land around their airports to grow. It looks like the Nashville airport is really landlocked.  Where can they grow for future expansion’s/future runways?

[markhollin]

I'm not sure I understand these complaints about the airport---we are in the midst of a $1.2 billion expansion over the next 5 years.  Rome wasn't built in a day, people.  Sheesh.  

And, yes, there are plans for another parallel runway on the east side of Donelson Pike.  But we already have four, which is more than adequate for our size.  It's not like we have lines of 15 jets waiting to take off.  I can't recall ever having a line of more than 4...and I have flown out of BNA at least 500 times over the past several decades. 

[SoundScan]

I believe that airport authority owns land east of runway 20L/2R with the intent to eventually build another parallel runway. As of now they have three active parallel runways which is more than enough to handle the current number of aircraft movements and well into the future. As for concourse expansion, they still have room to expand the apron around the terminal to allow for extensions of the B and C concourses to add more gates if necessary, but that is a long ways off and they are already adding more gates with the current expansion. We're still talking about an airport that handles ~13 million passengers per year. If you're thinking we need to pull a Denver and build a brand new airport facility in Lebanon (an equivalent distance from downtown Denver to DEN) then we need to find a few more passengers to travel through here. DEN handles around 60 million per year.

[NashRugger]

2 hours ago, e-dub said:

i thought we already were?

 

http://news.delta.com/delta-designs-first-kaboom-playground-nashville

Nope, on Raleigh has that distinction. 

[Pdt2f]

3 hours ago, e-dub said:

i thought we already were?

 

http://news.delta.com/delta-designs-first-kaboom-playground-nashville

I think the “focus” that the article is talking about is the focus on community involvement. 

2 hours ago, wreynol4 said:

1 may be completely wrong about this, but in my travels it seems like many other cities of a similar size have so much more land around their airports to grow. It looks like the Nashville airport is really landlocked.  Where can they grow for future expansion’s/future runways?

All those factories and warehouses west of the airport could totally be purchased and the land used to build another terminal, if the need ever arises. I’m not sure that Triumph factory does much of anything anymore, and they have a ton of acreage. FedEx and Embraer could be moved elsewhere and a terminal placed there, if need be. 

[NashRugger]

BNA has plenty of room that will carry it for many, many decades. The airport does own land east of Donelson Pike for another parallel runway in the plans in at least a decade or more. 3 main and the crosswind, the only departures runway before 0800, are all perfect for the amount of traffic we currently serve. 

The terminal has enough room to expand as well, and the plans are already there to fill in the massive pit behind the apron between B & C. 

[Pdt2f]

I would think that the only reason we would need to expand beyond current plans in the next decade or two would be if Nashville is named a hub by another airline, and traffic increased to the point where they wanted their own terminal. But I don’t see this happening any time soon, BNA isn’t maxed out and with more gates on the way there will be plenty of capacity. 

[jmtunafish]

Nashville has a nice airport, and it's about to get a whole lot nicer.  Pretty much the only peer cities that have bigger airports are those that serve as hubs (Charlotte, Salt Lake) or are major tourist centers (Orlando, Las Vegas).  Otherwise, BNA stacks up very nicely against airports in peer cities such as Raleigh, Austin, New Orleans, Kansas City, Indianapolis.  I'll even go out on a limb and say BNA is a nicer airport than SLC which, for a Delta hub that has several overseas flights, just doesn't offer much pizzazz.  I mean, how many airports have live music in their concourses?

Edited November 29, 2017 by jmtunafish
grammar

[Pdt2f]

^ My most recent airports I’ve been through, not counting BNA, were San Antonio, LaGuardia, and DCA in Washington. Nashville was better than San Antonio, although without the flights to Mexico, it was obviously better than LaGuardia (as is any public restroom), and I would say it was comparable to DCA. The scale may be vastly different, but the quality wasn’t.