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March 8, 2001 | ![]() |
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MIDWAY ADDING A HIKE TO THE ITINERARY
PASSENGERS WILL HAVE TO WALK 2 BLOCKS TO GET TO THE GATES FROM THE NEW TICKETING AND BAGGAGE AREA, WHICH WILL OPEN WEDNESDAY. By John Schmeltzer Tribune Staff Writer March 6, 2001 For more than 50 years, passengers
departing from Chicago's Midway Airport knew they could arrive minutes before
their flight without fear of missing it.
That's about to change.
Starting Wednesday, passengers who still
want to cut it close had better wear track shoes.
Chicago airport officials are opening the first phase of the airport's new
terminal, a move that will require passengers to hike two blocks from the east
side of Cicero Avenue to the existing departure gates across the street.
Like at the old terminal, passengers will still be able to park or be dropped
off only a few feet from the new ticketing and baggage areas. It's the hike to
the old gates that will challenge more than a few.
Moreover, it could be four more years before the "convenience" Chicagoans
associated with Midway is fully back. That's when the last shovel of dirt is
expected to be turned on the $793 million terminal development project.
The project will allow American Trans Air, better known as ATA, to expand its
service, including the addition of international flights to the Caribbean and
South America next year.
"Without this, our expansion plans would be not be possible," said Rick
Larsen, ATA's vice president of advertising and sales.
When completed, the terminal and concourse area will be more than triple the
current terminal's 260,000 square feet, allowing the airport to add more flights
and passengers. It will contain 41 plane-level gates, compared with the old
terminal's 29 gates that require passengers to climb stairs to board the plane.
More than half of the gates will be assigned to ATA and Southwest Airlines.
Last year, the airport handled about 300,000 landings and takeoffs--virtually
the same number it handled in 1999-- compared with the 450,000 operations in
1959, the year O'Hare opened.
Still, while Midway air operations barely grew last year, the number of
passengers moving through the old terminal, to board bigger planes, has been
growing 15 percent a year. Last year, 15 million travelers used Midway, which
was designed to accommodate 2 million, said Erin O'Donnell, deputy commissioner
of the Chicago Aviation Department and manager of Midway Airport.
Patty Kryscha, district marketing manager for Southwest, said the new
terminal will make things significantly better for airline employees and
passengers.
"It's going to make it much easier to hear pages, especially on Friday nights
when the old terminal was wall-to-wall people," Kryscha said.
O'Donnell emphasized that the opening is just the first of many changes that
will be taking place over the next three years as the airport moves into its new
quarters.
For instance, food at Midway will remain a work in progress until later this
summer, when the terminal's new 55,000-square-foot concession triangle opens.
Passengers can look forward to reprises of popular Chicago restaurants,
including Harry Caray's, Miller's Pub, Gold Coast Dogs, Manny's, Lalo's Mexican
Restaurant, Home Run Inn Pizza and Tuscany.
But as large as the new Midway terminal and concourses will be, the airport
still will be a little sister to the much larger O'Hare.
O'Hare has more than 170 gates housed in four terminals and is preparing to
begin construction of a fifth terminal. In addition, while only ATA is planning
to begin international service from Midway, both United Airlines and American
Airlines, along with 30 foreign carriers, offer non-stop service to more than 60
international destinations.
"Midway has a community-airport personality," O'Donnell said.
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