Kirk, Durbin emphasize O'Hare expansion after AMR merger

Read more: http://www.chicagobusiness.com/artic...#ixzz2LWtUiXk0

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They've sent letters to the merging companies CEOs nudging them to support the next phase of OMP. They mentioned the regulatory issues that the two companies will have to get past. As senators, Kirk and Durbin could delay the merger. A veiled threat?

American Airlines has applied with the DOT to serve Sao Paulo daily from Chicago starting in 2014. Brazil has restricted flight frequencies that must be allocated by the DOT, hence the need for this. United already serves Sao Paulo daily from ORD.

http://www.regulations.gov/#!documen...2013-0041-0001

I'm not surprised to hear this given the fact that I've met so many people from Sao Paulo that have moved to Chicago within the last year. Must be part of a larger trend

Finally some good news with them in Chicago. They seem to have backtracked at ORD internationally the last decade. Didn't AA fly this route and perhaps Rio in the past?

I wish American luck.

Which South American city has the greatest direct capacity to ORD? I'm really curious where Buenos Aires would fit into that list. Also Santiago.

Chicago really isn't in a good position geographically for service to deep South America. AA and UA both have hubs more suitable for South American service. Buenos Aires was tried years ago (by AA I believe) and it failed miserably. There aren't many business ties between Chicago and South America nor many South Americans living in Chicago. So the demand just isn't there to justify such a long flight. Sao Paulo being so massive is about the only city that can sustain service. Rio might be a possibility in the future, and Santiago on LAN but I think that's unlikely. For now the best way to get to most South American cities from Chicago is via Panama City on UA partner, Copa Airlines. 1-stop to just about everywhere.

Yup. Went to BA last year and ran more or less that route. Hell of a haul. Chicago>DC (9 hour layover)>Buenos Aires on Copa. And then further on to Patagonia after that through an Argentinian domestic carrier. Did the Panama transfer on the return trip.

Or even better, via MIA on AA.

I knew that the legacy carriers' hubs for South American traffic were chiefly ATL, MIA, and IAH, with additional capacity from NYC/LA, but I didn't realize that ORD had nothing but Buenos Aires Sao Paolo. Not really surprising but kinda depressing.

Forgive my ignorance, but are Panama City and Copa emerging as a premier connection route to Central and South America? UA seems to have a particularly close relationship with Copa, so that seems like a very solid endorsement. Are the aircraft, and is the airport, all pretty new and at current world standards of amenities, efficiency, cleanliness, reliability, etc.?

They have a big geographical advantage that most other hubs don't have. From Panama City, they can fly to just about every North American and South American city using 737s. They don't need larger and more costly widebody aircraft like 767s 777s etc.

Pretty much all of their aircraft are brand new as is their terminal in Panama City. They are a member of Star Alliance which wouldn't be the case if they didn't meet all the world standards.

The one South American nonstop destination from Chicago is Sao Paulo not Buenos Aires.

^ Thanks for the info on Copa. Maybe I can plan a dream trip down to the Andes now via Panama - I understand Quito just closed their world-leading-deadly airport in favor of a new one a little further from the mountains and less prone to crashes!

Sorry above I meant to refer to SP instead of Bueno Aires - I had just watched a travel show about Argentina...

Or even better yet, via ATL on DL.

Much, much better Customs & Immigration experience. Less rude, less slammed and much nicer overall facilities.

The terminal might be slightly better but I like Miami much better as a stop over. Alot more things to do and friends to see.

I wasn't speaking of the terminals per se, but of the entire Customs & Immigraton experience - and there is no comparison.

And sorry, but I must have somehow missed the part where the conversation switched from Central/Latin American connecting hubs to multi-day layover vacation spots. My bad.

Or if you connecting through DFW or JFK. It's your choice. If you catch the flight at JFK or DFW hub.

Once again I ask the modertor: Is this thread about O'hare expansion or airline flights, scheduling and destinations using O'Hare? If the latter, then start a separate transportation thread. If there is not enough actual O'Hare expansion news/material/discussion, than drop the thread or roll it into General Developments.

^ How are you so incapable of understanding that those two things are inextricably linked?

Occasionally there are posts made that go a little astray, but you need to understand some things about this thread.

1. There is simply not enough news to fill this thread with a terminal/airfield development every week. Are you actually saying we must leave this thread silent for months at a time until there is news worthy of posting here? Are you just annoyed when you click on a thread and discover you're not interested in the post? Merging with General Developments is a ridiculous idea and is a waste of what the internet is all about. If you want only hard facts reporting, don't bother with these forums, just read the Tribune or Sun-Times or Crain's.

2. You need to grasp that transportation and public works threads are totally different from skyscraper threads. A skyscraper is almost always a private development on a small plot of private land that needs to take minimal consideration of its connection to the city around it. But a public works project like an airport or a rail line involves governments, public money, taxation, social issues, energy and pollution matters, and even more profoundly they set the tone and foundation for how a city or region will grow many decades into the future. So any transportation thread will be extremely wide-ranging and will occasionally tread even into partisan politics debates.

3. Airport discussions invariably involve aircraft discussions and route discussions. Whether a future 777 will have a wider wingspan is relevant (because of ORD taxiway sizes and gate layout). Whether the 787 is certified for ETOPS 180 is relevant (because the number of destinations may be limited). Whether the AA merger with US Airways is approved by the government is relevant (because merging with a different carrier could affect ORD's role as a hub). I'm sorry if we discuss whether UA is adding satellite-based broadband in its aircraft when ORD news is slow, but the health and strength of UA is essential to ORD. As you may have noticed, ORD expansion is ultimately funded in large part by UA and AA and so we are all stakeholders in how the companies are managed.

4. You have managed all of 57 posts in 6.5 years (will little effort put into spelling or typing them) on SSP, which means many months can go by without you posting a single thing. So your own preferences take precedence over the other forumers exactly why?

^Touche, denizen247.

I come to and comment in this thread because I'm very interested in the ORD expansion, love Chicago and happen to be married to the transport industry.

Denizen, I agree with most - but not all of your points. Simply make the thread topic Chicago area air transport. Easy.

You would probably be surpised at what I DO understand; don't be patronizing.

Citing my posting frequency is petty and irrelevant. You should be happy I don't post more - - you'd be bored to tears.

I will try to watch my typing . . . .

^ Oh, a thread name change, if you put it that way that's an interesting suggestion. At least until there is an active construction site on some public buildings at O'Hare.

I don't think you should hold back posts just because you think they are boring. But there is a wag the dog feeling when people who seem minor participants try to call the cops (moderators) on active participants in the middle of an enthusiastic discussion. It's so hard always to know how many active readers there are who are silent, so why not make your presence known once in a while if you are a frequent reader, it doesn't matter if it's a boring comment or question.

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To throw in an on-topic, vaguely O'Hare-related comment, I was thinking the hyper-unlikely scenario of the Cubs playing in Rosemont would have one interesting side effect - they could market themselves to travelers with long layovers. But I think the site would be like within a hundred yards of a runway path, maybe quite a problem for various reasons.

As you mention, Rosemont is not an option for the Cubs. Without a charming, old-timey stadium surrounded by a walkable neighborhood full of convenient bars, there's really no reason to go to a Cubs game. I'd still be a fan, but the legions of wealthy young suburbanites that traipse down to Wrigleyville would evaporate. That's not to mention that Rosemont is already a traffic nightmare. It has the Blue Line, but there aren't any nearby sites for a stadium, and it doesn't really have the pedestrian infrastructure of sidewalks and paths (ever tried to walk to the convention center?)

A longstanding dream of mine is to reconfigure the I-190/River Road interchange with a pedestrian bridge. It would seriously help city residents access the stuff that's out there. Some median refuge islands and crosswalk signals (sans button) would go a long way as well.

The summer of inaugural flights has begun.

March 23rd - Air Berlin (Berlin)
April 10th - Qatar Airways (Doha)
April 11th - American Airlines (Dusseldorf)
May 17th - Austrian Airlines (Vienna)
September 3rd - Hainan Airlines (Beijing)


http://kngkyle.com/uploads/2013-03-25_2323.png

^ That's awesome - do they do that for every new carrier?


Dedicated page on QR website:

http://www.qatarairways.com/us/en/of...icagosale.page
INTRODUCING 5-STAR FLIGHTS FROM CHICAGO
Starting April 10, 2013 you will be able to fly from the Windy City to the Qatar Airways network of over 120 destinations. Enjoy 5-star flights to India, Pakistan, Southeast Asia, and many other worldwide locations. Enjoy the great amenities that make Qatar Airways the World's Best Airline: with international cuisine, spacious seating, World-class entertainment options, and complimentary beer & wine, fly to your next international destination in luxury and comfort. Please keep checking this page to take advantage of great specials on flights from Chicago.

Im suprised the airplane didn't need a deice after that since it was so cold!! I hear that really happened at BWI once, they did the fire truck salute and the UA 777 needed a deice afterwards:)

T5 renovation updates

http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8106/8...c3c6b47a9c.jpg
New Restrooms at T5 by flyt5, on Flickr
http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8377/8...062ef07e7c.jpg
New Restrooms at T5 by flyt5, on Flickr
http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8108/8...491ca9598d.jpg
New Swatch Shop at T5 by flyt5, on Flickr
http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8232/8...a7ba7ba824.jpg
New Dufry Shop at T5 by flyt5, on Flickr
http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8111/8...7dcccd77c8.jpg
Hudson News Shop at T5 by flyt5, on Flickr

FINALLY world-class (-looking) terminal amenities in Chicago, that don't look like some parochial union hack job that will dilapidate in a half decade. I look forward to seeing them (and closely checking the build quality).

Qatar and Double Jet Bridges at ORD Terminal 5
 

Any pics of Qatar's 773 at the terminal at ORD yesterday for their launch? Why don't any of ORD's terminal 5 gates have double jet-bridges? I travel abroad about once a month and every airport across the world seems to have double jet-bridges boarding the 777s, 747s, 332s, and 333s.

Because the entire terminal 5 does not have double dual jetbridge. Only a single airbridge.

That's not a reason. Why doesn't it have any then?

^ In a lot of cases, a 2nd jetbridge is used for boarding premium cabins (including premium economy), so maybe sometimes airlines (or airports) mainly view a 2nd jetbridge as an amenity to ease boarding frustration for high-paying customers, rather than as a necessity? Obviously far from ideal when you get up to 400-passenger aircraft, but I believe jumbo jets don't usually need quick turnaround times like a 737 would (seeing as longhaul aircraft often make just one or maybe two roundtrips a day).

Not that this is excusable for ORD. Was T5 designed without ability to do dual jetbridges (are the gates too close together?), or are they just balking at the costs?

New to this so be nice:) but here is the Inaugural Airberlin Flight and also the new American Airlines 777 livery landing at O'Hare

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xftr6hdSmE0

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V-DlmBdPkos

Austrian Airlines started their flights to Chicago the other day. They seemed to put on a bit of a show for it in Vienna.

From their facebook:
http://kngkyle.com/uploads/2013-05-19_1547.png
http://kngkyle.com/uploads/2013-05-19_1547_001.png
http://kngkyle.com/uploads/2013-05-19_1548.png

Hopefully it's a success.

Wow! Very nice. Hope those route will be done very well. Didn't they flew ORD-VIE back in early 2000 or so.

Chicago: Al Capone. Blues Brothers. Michael Jordan. Amirite?

^ We've done a lousy job of branding ourselves. This bothers me a lot. It's hard because we have the national media working against us generally -- they love propagating stereotypes. When the Feb 2011 snowstorm closed Lake Shore Drive, the NY Times put a photo on the front page, emphasizing the trope that Chicago sits on the edge of the Canadian tundra. When weather disasters happen in NY, like the tornado that ripped through Brooklyn a couple years back or Sandy last fall, the stories are always about how the city residents bond together and help each other out. Let's also conveniently ignore that NY is poorly-sited and faces a bleak future with global warming, while Chicago will generally benefit from warmer winters. (I use NY as an example because most of the national media is based there.)

Anyway, I think Al Capone has been superseded for the most part by MJ and a few pop culture images like Blues Brothers and ER, et cetera. If Obama returns for good in 2017 it could help too.

The Blues Brothers thing above is fantastic; I didn't realize there was such awareness, and admiration, of this slice of pop culture over in haute-couture Vienna.

Yeah, I'm surprised too, although I don't necessarily see why the Blues Brothers are a bad image for the city. Yes, the movie shows bits of 70s urban blight, but it mostly shows a large, diverse city with a rich musical tradition, the New Orleans of the North. This doesn't sync up with the glamorous global city Chicago that we're used to, but it also doesn't sweep the entire South Side and the city's massive black/latino populations under the rug. The Blues Brothers are a pretty harmless icon for Chicago IMO.

^ I should clarify, I was lamenting in agreement with ChG's general comment, and was not lamenting about the usage of the Blues Brothers. I'm happy with them using this imagery; it's leaps and bounds better than Al Capone. One thing, though, is that I imagine much of the world hasn't actually seen the movie, so when they think of the Blues Brothers they immediately see either one of two things -- quasi-benign, old-timey gangsters (a step backwards for us), or cool, suave blues players representing Chicago's music scene. It would probably serve us well if there were some kind of effort to emphasize the latter association, which would help foreclose the former. Always try to have at least one of the suit-and-shades guys holding a saxophone or something. It wouldn't hurt if there were some social event with a foreign leader or something where Obama copped the outfit and played a quick riff either - here's to hoping.

Yes they did fly to Chicago in the past. I wish them well, I'm not sure what will be differerent this time around with establishing this new route with Europe's recession.

Are they using terminal 5 for departures?

^ I actually think Chicago's branding is not as bad as people make it out to be.

People in suits and hats wearing shades is not a bad image to have. Kind of intriguing, and most people are intelligent enough to know that there is much, much more to a major city than just a few stereotypes.

O'hare Modernization Plan Phase 3
 

- Do we know if this last phase will happen with the completion of a new terminal 4? It seems like with the new carriers coming now the space at T-5 is limited. Most talk about the gate space, but going through passport contral and customs is becoming a huge bottleneck inside between 1 pm and 7 pm now.
- Will the idea of having One World partners be co-located at a new Terminal 4 and Star Alliance partners be co-located at a new Terminal 2 ever see the light of day? Even though T-2 is getting some updates, it is an embarassment to the airport with how they route so many passengers to walk outside and around planes when they arrive on many United Express flights.
- Are there any gates being prepped to handle the 380? If so which ones? Who could potentially bring it to ORD? Korean or Lufthansa? I read that Lufthansa was going to bring the 747-8 to ORD, but I have not seen that scheduled. I'm still surprised that the 380 is going to ATL, MIA, Dulles, SFO with nothing on the horizon to ORD.

I would be shocked to see T-4 ever built. I think it's more likely the city could build T-6 to get a bunch more international space while freeing up some room in T-5 for domestic operators who want to get into ORD. The airlines really hate the idea of the western terminal (which isn't needed yet anyway) so they might buy some time and agree to have T-6 built....or at least agree not kick up a fuss if they city bonds it out instead.

Otherwise incremental upgrades to the other terminals seem to be the order of the day (other than the airfield upgrades happening under OMP). If the rest of the airport can get the treatment T-5 is getting that would be great.

And also, JFK, LAX, & YYZ as well.

Building a sterile connection between T3 and T5 would do more to opening up the airport than anything else. The next thing I would do is rebuild T2 with customs facilities that both UA and AA can use.

Absolutely not! There is no way to connection from T3 to T5. Because it was too far away from there. It's too extremely expensive. Instead, they have to take a tram from entire T3 to T5.

The problem is having to exit and then re-enter the secured areas in order to connect to a T5 flight....which can take far too long. It is poorly designed. At minimum, the airport could offer a bus shuttle between post-security gates between the two terminals. (Actually I believe British Airways already offers this service for its travelers)

I also agree that a new T2 terminal with customs would be super.

What are you talking about? All it would take is a pedestrian tunnel between Concourse K and the center of Terminal 5 similar to the one that connects Concourses B and C in Terminal 1. American and One World carriers could then use Terminal 5 for international operations, UA and Star Alliance carriers would use a retrofitted or rebuilt Terminal 2 with customs, and a new Terminal 6 could be built as an attachment to existing Terminal 5 for non-aligned carriers.

^ The idea of a sterile connection is great, but would ORD need to have some kind of control for domestic passengers desiring to enter the international departures concourse? Of course I'm aware there is free intermixing of international departing, domestic departing, and domestic arriving passengers in the T1 concourse, but the T1 international flights are only with a very limited number of carriers (UA, NH, and LH only I think) and go only to certain specific major foreign cities; I believe the US gov't is not worried about doing airtight passport checks of who is leaving the country this way because it has agreements with those airports (countries) or at least has confirmed that those airports have reliable immigration procedures. In the case of T5, however, where all other foreign carriers are lumped together, the gov't may need to be more strict about watching who is leaving to go to, say, Bogota, Kingston, Lagos, or Tashkent. (I confess my experience in international departures from US airports besides ORD is limited pretty much to just alliance and codeshare departures, and I don't know how this works at LAX, ATL, etc.)

So if there has to be some kind of immigration check where sterile tunnel users walk into T5, it may begin to defeat the time savings of having a sterile tunnel in the first place, compared to the existing landside tram route.

In any event, a T3-T5 tunnel would be extremely expensive, considering it would go under heavily used tarmac and taxiway arteries where drainage and other subterranean utilities may also run, and then would need to run underneath/through much of T5 in order to emerge at the far side of T5 where intl arrivals have cleared customs. All of that for limited benefit: (1) the volume of passengers making this sterile trek would be only a fraction of the volume using the similarly-sized T1 tunnel, and (2) it's a massive capital outlay by the City that adds no new gates and no new revenue-generating facilities.

I think he's envisioning a conversion of Concourse K to international, whereupon the city would build a new customs check at that end. This would enable international passengers from T5 to transfer anywhere within the airport without leaving security, although a T5-T1 connection is still pretty shitty on foot.

A large airport like ORD should really have a secureside tram as well; the new one at IAD is pretty impressive and a good example. The western terminal plans always called for an underground tram but that is shelved, for the moment.

http://finance.yahoo.com/news/chicag...180500330.html

The sterile connection would be to the sterile, post-security departures level of T5. It means connecting traffic using AA or UA could then fly internationally on carriers that depart from T5 without having to exit T1 or T3 and ride the tram to T5 and clear security again. The US does not have immigration checks for leaving the country the same way most other countries do. International flights depart from many of the same gates that domestic flights depart from at most, if not all major US airports.