North of 53MIL for 2016 as expected. 10% growth in International traffic should see SFO leapfrog Atlanta, O'Hare and Newark and move to the #4 spot for international gateway traffic. Not sure about Int'l growth numbers at OAK and SJC but their combined Int'l traffic probably finished at around 1.3MIL.

http://media.flysfo.com.s3.amazonaws.co ... 201612.pdf

Also 5% growth in domestic... Great news to hear, it makes a need for a better expansion plan even greater now.

Seattle has also had record traffic, I believe 42 million plus. How are LAX, SJC, SAN & PDX doing? Economically, the west coast has been operating full steam ahead, so I'm not surprised SFO's numbers are as impressive as they are.

The weather must have been better in SFO last year.

As well as the tech biz, I think SF has had a huge tourist boom as well, the world has woken up in a big way to what a beautiful city SF is for tourism it seems.

As for SFO, despite the influx, the airport never seems overcrowded; security can occasionally go badly but normally it's fine and the rest of the facilities are excellent.

Re OAK: "For the year, 12,070,967 passengers chose to fly to or from Oakland, a 7.7% increase over the 2015 total of 11,205,063. It is the busiest year for passenger traffic since 2007, when the airport saw 14.6 million passengers.

The continued passenger growth at OAK follows the addition of several new domestic and international routes during 2016. In 2017, OAK is set to become California’s third busiest gateway to Europe as British Airways and Norwegian Air Shuttle initiate new routes this spring and summer."

http://www.oaklandairport.com/oakland-i ... gers-2016/

Prost wrote:

Seattle has also had record traffic, I believe 42 million plus. How are LAX, SJC, SAN & PDX doing? Economically, the west coast has been operating full steam ahead, so I'm not surprised SFO's numbers are as impressive as they are.

LAX saw 80,921,527 passengers in 2016, at least 20 million of which were international. Source. Check out the infographics on page 88 that break down the distribution of passengers among US airports in 2015.

YVR 22.3M, international up 11.9% Asia Pacific up a huge 15.7%, overall up 9.7% led in large part by Air Canada.

I stand corrected on SEA numbers, SEA had 45,736,700. Of course the SEA market doesn't also have an OAK or SJC nearby either.

Prost wrote:

How are LAX, SJC, SAN & PDX doing?

SJC hit 10.8 million passengers last year, a 10.2% increase over 2015. This is the largest percent increase in all the Top 50 US airports. This is the largest total pax at SJC since 2002, and that was when AA still had a hub at SJC.

Prost wrote:

Seattle has also had record traffic, I believe 42 million plus. How are LAX, SJC, SAN & PDX doing?

Top 10 in US.

SJC San Jose: +12.55%
PDX Portland: +10.18%
BNA Nashville: +9.51%
SEA Seattle: +9.42%
MCI Kansas City: +9.37%
DEN Denver: +9.12%
RDU Raleigh-Durham: +9.10%
FLL Fort Lauderdale: +9.07%
OMA Eppley Airfield: +9.02%
IND Indianapolis Airport: +8.97%

http://www.omaha.com/money/with-rise-in ... ce130.html

jetblastdubai wrote:

Prost wrote:

Seattle has also had record traffic, I believe 42 million plus. How are LAX, SJC, SAN & PDX doing?

Top 10 in US.

SJC San Jose: +12.55%
PDX Portland: +10.18%
BNA Nashville: +9.51%
SEA Seattle: +9.42%
MCI Kansas City: +9.37%
DEN Denver: +9.12%
RDU Raleigh-Durham: +9.10%
FLL Fort Lauderdale: +9.07%
OMA Eppley Airfield: +9.02%
IND Indianapolis Airport: +8.97%

http://www.omaha.com/money/with-rise-in ... ce130.html

The numbers above are for total seat increases not traffic increases. Obviously the traffic increases for each of these airports will be less than the seat increases. IND, for example, experienced a 6.4% traffic increase in 2016.

KLMatSJC wrote:

Prost wrote:

How are LAX, SJC, SAN & PDX doing?

SJC hit 10.8 million passengers last year, a 10.2% increase over 2015. This is the largest percent increase in all the Top 50 US airports. This is the largest total pax at SJC since 2002, and that was when AA still had a hub at SJC.

What was the high-water mark for SJC? Did it ever hit 12MIL? Also at what point does the southern extension of Terminal B make sense?

Looks like SFO might need some more gates; here is the tentative expansion plan:
http://media.flysfo.com.s3.amazonaws.co ... ojects.pdf

simpv wrote:

Looks like SFO might need some more gates; here is the tentative expansion plan:
http://media.flysfo.com.s3.amazonaws.co ... ojects.pdf

This is their current incremental upgrade plans for 10-15 narrowbody compatible gates. After that it is remote stands and a hard decision. If they want to significantly expand airline ops the UA maintenance base will have to go. SFO is unable to acquire any adjacent land so what they have now is all they will ever get. Expanding into the bay while extremely feasible from a construction standpoint has little chance to obtain the environmental approvals needed.

SFOA380 wrote:

KLMatSJC wrote:

Prost wrote:

How are LAX, SJC, SAN & PDX doing?

SJC hit 10.8 million passengers last year, a 10.2% increase over 2015. This is the largest percent increase in all the Top 50 US airports. This is the largest total pax at SJC since 2002, and that was when AA still had a hub at SJC.

What was the high-water mark for SJC? Did it ever hit 12MIL? Also at what point does the southern extension of Terminal B make sense?

I believe it hit 12 million before the dot-com bubble burst and 9/11 and when AA/QQ still had a hub at SJC.

The south concourse will only be built when the airport passes 18 million AFAIK.

atypical wrote:

simpv wrote:

Looks like SFO might need some more gates; here is the tentative expansion plan:
http://media.flysfo.com.s3.amazonaws.co ... ojects.pdf

This is their current incremental upgrade plans for 10-15 narrowbody compatible gates. After that it is remote stands and a hard decision. If they want to significantly expand airline ops the UA maintenance base will have to go. SFO is unable to acquire any adjacent land so what they have now is all they will ever get. Expanding into the bay while extremely feasible from a construction standpoint has little chance to obtain the environmental approvals needed.

It also adds a ton of flexibility as well. The plan adds swing gates to B/A B and B/A F as well as a whole new B/A H. All said this plan increases Int'l widebody capacity by nearly 40%.

SFOA380 wrote:

atypical wrote:

simpv wrote:

Looks like SFO might need some more gates; here is the tentative expansion plan:
http://media.flysfo.com.s3.amazonaws.co ... ojects.pdf

This is their current incremental upgrade plans for 10-15 narrowbody compatible gates. After that it is remote stands and a hard decision. If they want to significantly expand airline ops the UA maintenance base will have to go. SFO is unable to acquire any adjacent land so what they have now is all they will ever get. Expanding into the bay while extremely feasible from a construction standpoint has little chance to obtain the environmental approvals needed.

It also adds a ton of flexibility as well. The plan adds swing gates to B/A B and B/A F as well as a whole new B/A H. All said this plan increases Int'l widebody capacity by nearly 40%.

I don't see them letting the Maintenance base go. It holds too many jobs in the area. The politicians would have an outcry and the Airport Commissioner would be kicked out.

They seem to be completely sure they will build B/A H. All the new diagrams they released after the ADP came out have the new boarding area.

SFO will never be done with their construction.

simpv wrote:

Looks like SFO might need some more gates; here is the tentative expansion plan:
http://media.flysfo.com.s3.amazonaws.co ... ojects.pdf

What is the timeline for these projects? Do you have any more info on them?

hayzel777 wrote:

I don't see them letting the Maintenance base go. It holds too many jobs in the area. The politicians would have an outcry and the Airport Commissioner would be kicked out.

The airport employs 33,000 people and the Maintenance Base employs 3,000. Converting the area to from maintenance to terminal is likely to employee far more than 3,000 with a direct economic impact far exceeding the revenue rent and employment from the Maintenance Base.

The Airport Commissioner is going to be kicked out once they raise the white flag to further passenger expansion.

The biggest reason is that the airport cannot acquire any further space and the Maintenance Base not needed. Gates will be. If expansion is going to occur beyond an incremental increase in gates then something has to go since there is only so much land. Maybe you have something that I am missing. I'll volunteer to the the guy who was wrong and stuck my foot in my mouth for this edition of Airlines.net.

UA's SFO maintenance base lease expires in 2023, but there is nothing I know internally that would suggest UA would be happy to walk away even with the high cost involved in Bay Area.

The SFO tech ops center will actually gain importance at the airline as United's LAX maintenance facilities are consolidated and a new much smaller hangar complex is built down here by 2019. The result will be the carrier will have halved it capacity which will need to be transferred someplace.

Losing SFO also would be such a massive reduction in house capacity I don't know where it would be made up and create rather significant issues with unions as there are practical contract limitations around scope and job security requirements.

That land is a lot more valuable as gate space than as maintenance space. They can do maintenance in Stockton or San Bernardino or literally anywhere else that isn't some of the most valuable, expensive real estate on earth.

atypical wrote:

hayzel777 wrote:

I don't see them letting the Maintenance base go. It holds too many jobs in the area. The politicians would have an outcry and the Airport Commissioner would be kicked out.

The airport employs 33,000 people and the Maintenance Base employs 3,000. Converting the area to from maintenance to terminal is likely to employee far more than 3,000 with a direct economic impact far exceeding the revenue rent and employment from the Maintenance Base.

The Airport Commissioner is going to be kicked out once they raise the white flag to further passenger expansion.

The biggest reason is that the airport cannot acquire any further space and the Maintenance Base not needed. Gates will be. If expansion is going to occur beyond an incremental increase in gates then something has to go since there is only so much land. Maybe you have something that I am missing. I'll volunteer to the the guy who was wrong and stuck my foot in my mouth for this edition of Airlines.net.

3,000 is a lot in the Bay Area for Blue Collar work. The only other major blue collar work left in the Bay Area is a Tesla Factory and construction. If anyone even dared to propose that, you can expect the community to have an uproar since the blue collar work left is the only thing keeping the COL from going through the roof.
United has pretty much expanded to where they can already. Delta/American/Southwest have also expanded to pretty much where they can already. VX is going to acquire the whole T2 when AA moves to T1. Everyone that wanted to expand domestic has pretty much expanded already.
The only area that needs more gates is the International Terminal and they have already acquired swing gates on the A side via the Terminal 1 redevelopment and the proposed B/A H and swing gatesa in B/A F through the Boarding Area F remodeling that UA will begin soon.
If they airport really needed space, they can move the BR cargo building, all the cargo receiving buildings,all the small United Express buildings(UA has space to accommodate those buildings by shrinking the parking lot or the aircraft storage space), and the flight kitchen away from the G side(all of these are next to the threshold of 10L/R) and clear that whole space up for new gates. Even without the maintenance base there, it will be very hard for them to use that space since it is in a very awkward position and boxed in on all sides by parking lots/cargo ramp/the runway thresholds/long term parking/soon-to-be airport admin building/proposed consolidated rental car center

Chemist wrote:

The weather must have been better in SFO last year.

This is not as important as it used to be. With new technology that allows for SOIA and CSPR (.308) approaches, fog and low ceilings do not create nearly the delays they did in the past. Coupled approaches will almost completely make weather related delays at SFO a thing of the past.

ucdtim17 wrote:

That land is a lot more valuable as gate space than as maintenance space. They can do maintenance in Stockton or San Bernardino or literally anywhere else that isn't some of the most valuable, expensive real estate on earth.

Pretty sure UA would prefer to have the mx base at a hub airport as to not deal with the ferrying of empty planes. Its costly to ferry these aircraft around. It is much more practical at hub airports since you can easily pull the plane off the line when it flies in and replace it with another aircraft.

If they take the mx base away, they will need to also take away all the long term parking/taxi holding lots/rideshare lots/cellphone lot/cargo ramp and building since these things do effectively block the mx area in and where will they place all these things?

atlflyer wrote:

simpv wrote:

Looks like SFO might need some more gates; here is the tentative expansion plan:
http://media.flysfo.com.s3.amazonaws.co ... ojects.pdf

What is the timeline for these projects? Do you have any more info on them?

If this means anything but they did the same master plan in '97 and have pretty much finished what they can already. Many of the proposed projects from '97 were struck down because of environmentalists including the filling in of a portion of the bay to separate the runways more in order to allow for parallel landings even during inclement weather.

hayzel777 wrote:

3,000 is a lot in the Bay Area for Blue Collar work. The only other major blue collar work left in the Bay Area is a Tesla Factory and construction. If anyone even dared to propose that, you can expect the community to have an uproar since the blue collar work left is the only thing keeping the COL from going through the roof.

I disagree. Those 3,000 jobs aren't going to be felt even if they just disappeared. Most don't live in the city/county of San Francisco so their absence will have even less economic and political impact to the politicians in control. The clout here is UA. If the area is converted to gates those 3,000 workers will be replaced by more workers command more pay than the displaced workers. Most of those jobs also would be blue collar so it will be a wash or an improvement.

hayzel777 wrote:

United has pretty much expanded to where they can already. Delta/American/Southwest have also expanded to pretty much where they can already. VX is going to acquire the whole T2 when AA moves to T1. Everyone that wanted to expand domestic has pretty much expanded already.
The only area that needs more gates is the International Terminal and they have already acquired swing gates on the A side via the Terminal 1 redevelopment and the proposed B/A H and swing gatesa in B/A F through the Boarding Area F remodeling that UA will begin soon.

So the Boarding Area B new construction will only result result in a net gain of 5 gates. The other gate improvements proposed will only add ~15 NB or a mix of ~6 WB/5 NB (5 of those NB gates are for a UA Boarding area). JetBlue by itself runs 11 flights a day from International because there are no domestic gates.

If I am reading your statement correctly, you are indicating that SFO will never need any further NB gates beyond what is planned because all the majors or all the current domestic operators have all internally completed any expansion they are interest in providing to SFO and therefore what NB gates the airport is adding will be sufficient and further gates are unnecessary. If that is incorrect what do you think the total additional NB gates are needed?

hayzel777 wrote:

If they airport really needed space, they can move the BR cargo building, all the cargo receiving buildings,all the small United Express buildings(UA has space to accommodate those buildings by shrinking the parking lot or the aircraft storage space), and the flight kitchen away from the G side(all of these are next to the threshold of 10L/R) and clear that whole space up for new gates. Even without the maintenance base there, it will be very hard for them to use that space since it is in a very awkward position and boxed in on all sides by parking lots/cargo ramp/the runway thresholds/long term parking/soon-to-be airport admin building/proposed consolidated rental car center

I am not sure where BR is, none of my maps have a listing like this. How many gates would this idea create? Where would removed building be relocated?

For the Maintenance Base area a good 30 to 40 new gates can easily be fit and an underground rail system can feed it. There is nothing to indicate that expansion opportunities are going to plateau. The airport is due for another Master Plan. At that point the Commission will need to make a commitment to choosing a future. The Commission should be clarifying this now but isn't and that's bad for everyone.

Prost wrote:

How are LAX, SJC, SAN & PDX doing? Economically, the west coast has been operating full steam ahead, so I'm not surprised SFO's numbers are as impressive as they are.

PDX just broke 18 million passengers (18.3 million to be exact). More growth is predicted as AS adds builds its PDX hub and DL adds LHR.

hayzel777 wrote:

ucdtim17 wrote:

That land is a lot more valuable as gate space than as maintenance space. They can do maintenance in Stockton or San Bernardino or literally anywhere else that isn't some of the most valuable, expensive real estate on earth.

Pretty sure UA would prefer to have the mx base at a hub airport as to not deal with the ferrying of empty planes. Its costly to ferry these aircraft around. It is much more practical at hub airports since you can easily pull the plane off the line when it flies in and replace it with another aircraft.

If they take the mx base away, they will need to also take away all the long term parking/taxi holding lots/rideshare lots/cellphone lot/cargo ramp and building since these things do effectively block the mx area in and where will they place all these things?

Damn straight UA likes SFO as an MX hub however that is not the best thing for the public. SFO can't acquire land around the airport so what's there is all they will ever have, eventually it will come down to choosing the MX base or significant passenger growth. Both isn't an option but they can just sit there for a long time.

hayzel777 wrote:

atypical wrote:

hayzel777 wrote:

United has pretty much expanded to where they can already. Delta/American/Southwest have also expanded to pretty much where they can already. VX is going to acquire the whole T2 when AA moves to T1. Everyone that wanted to expand domestic has pretty much expanded already.
The only area that needs more gates is the International Terminal and they have already acquired swing gates on the A side via the Terminal 1 redevelopment and the proposed B/A H and swing gatesa in B/A F through the Boarding Area F remodeling that UA will begin soon.
If they airport really needed space, they can move the BR cargo building.

I don't think so.... Their is a reason why International A is running tons of domestic opp' s out of and that is because there is a lack of domestic gates. Even when SFO completes all the terminal rebuilds in the next 8 years they may be needing more gates at that time?

babastud wrote:

hayzel777 wrote:

atypical wrote:

I don't think so.... Their is a reason why International A is running tons of domestic opp' s out of and that is because there is a lack of domestic gates. Even when SFO completes all the terminal rebuilds in the next 8 years they may be needing more gates at that time?

Only JetBlue(11 flights), Hawaiian(2 flights), and Sun Country(1 flight) regularly run flights out of the Intl. A side. JetBlue uses 3 gates, Hawaiian only needs two wide body gates for about 2 hours in the morning/an hour in the evening and Sun Country can just borrow a gate from an airline for its one flight. Alaska, Southwest, Frontier are just borrowing the Intl. A while they await the rebuild of T1.

AS has big plans for SFO; growth is going to be a big factor there going forward.

EA CO AS wrote:

AS has big plans for SFO; growth is going to be a big factor there going forward.

We will see what UA has to say about that. Aside from a lack of gate space we are seeing a resurgent UA that won't go quietly into the night.

ual777 wrote:

EA CO AS wrote:

AS has big plans for SFO; growth is going to be a big factor there going forward.

We will see what UA has to say about that. Aside from a lack of gate space we are seeing a resurgent UA that won't go quietly into the night.

Much like with DL at SEA, there's room enough at SFO for two carriers to have hub operations. Obviously UA's will always be far, far larger though.

There is an unused maintenance hanger at OAK originally built by World Airways and later leased by United. That could absorb some of the SFO maintenance activity, though it is somewhat smaller.

SFOThinker wrote:

There is an unused maintenance hanger at OAK originally built by World Airways and later leased by United. That could absorb some of the SFO maintenance activity, though it is somewhat smaller.

Thats coming down soon for a future expansion, hasn't been used as a true hangar in several years. If SFO takes down the maintenance area, UA would probably have to build up a maintenance op at a pretty empty airport nearby like SCK for example.