Tampa May Need to Build Second Terminal Complex within Five Years

TAMPA, Fla. -- Tampa International Airport officials, who hoped to squeeze another 15 years out of their terminal complex, learned they might have to build a second one in the next five years.

"It's absolutely possible," said Louis Miller, executive director of the Hillsborough County Aviation Authority. "If the forecasts are accurate, that could be where we're headed."

Pete Ricondo of Ricondo & Associates, a consultant helping create TIA's new 20-year master plan, told the aviation authority board that even modest passenger growth could put the current terminal facilities at maximum capacity by 2010 or 2011.

The complex was designed originally to serve as many as 20-million passengers a year. Miller had planned to try to convince airlines to share such things as gates, computer systems and counter space, which he thought could increase passenger capacity to 25-million.

However, post Sept. 11, 2001, security requirements and the delays they cause are making 20-million look again like the upper limit, Miller said.

Ricondo projects the airport will serve more than 17.6-million passengers next year, 19.9-million by 2010 and more than 22-million by 2015.

Even at current passenger levels, there already are significant delays during peak travel times, such as Monday mornings and holidays.

For the first nine months of this year, TIA experienced an average growth of 12.27 percent, well above the national average of 5.8 percent. But that record-setting growth rate isn't likely to last.

"We came all the way back this year from the effects of 2001, and the rest of the country should catch up next year," Miller said at a workshop on the airport's future Thursday.

TIA will, however, continue to grow at a rate in single digits, Ricondo said. He said "a conservative estimate" puts passenger growth this year at 13.2 percent and then ranges between 1.6 and 2.8 percent a year out to 2025.

Tampa lawyer Stephen Mitchell, a member of the authority board, said population pressure might accelerate airport growth beyond the projections.

Florida's population, about 17-million now, is projected to be more than 23-million by 2020, he said. "A major portion of that growth is coming to the west coast."

The second terminal complex will be a capital project that will run into hundreds of millions of dollars financed by airport funds, bonds and grants from the Federal Aviation Administration. When officials finally have to build it, it will require some major surgery on the airport grounds.

The new complex, likely to be a mirror image of the current one, will sit on the north end of airport property, requiring a rerouting of Hillsborough Avenue to make room. It will have its own airsides. Which terminal a passenger uses will depend on the airline he is flying.

A third north-south runway is planned for about 2010. The FAA tower will have to be moved to ensure controllers' lines of sight to all aircraft. The employee parking lot on the north side of the airport property will have to move to the south side, where the post office now sits, and the post office will move off site.

Cargo operations will move to property the aviation authority has been buying in Drew Park, near the new Federal Express facility.

Although 2010 sounds like a long way off, "you know how long something as big as a new airport complex takes to plan," said TIA spokeswoman Brenda Geoghagan.

TIA officials on Thursday also talked about a more immediate problem: dealing with people who park by the curbs at the arrival and departure doors. They stay in their cars so the vehicles aren't towed as security risks, but some stay put for 30 minutes or more.

The problem is particularly severe outside baggage claim.

"We've got the flight information outside there where people can see it, and if they're meeting a plane that's late, they're going to have to move and wait somewhere else," Miller said.

He said he is considering a plan that would allow motorists to park for up to an hour free in the remote economy lot.

"Everybody's got cell phones now," he said. "They can wait somewhere away from the terminal until they get a call from their passengers that they're ready to go."

The blue side arrivals level is the most congested, particularly in the late afternoon and early evening. The red side is less so, because Airside C, on the red side, is under construction; there is little traffic still using the antiquated Airside D.

Miller called curbside congestion "a problem we have to deal with," but said he doesn't want to be heavy-handed about it.

"When I first came here, we had a Gestapo-style to our curbside management, and we had no curbside problem, but people hated the airport," Miller said. "We went to a friendlier style, and now we have to address curbside management again. We can't go on like this."