I know some airports do this in other countries, but I don't see it working well here. I'd rather just see the passenger use fee increased, but it's likely already very high compared to other airports given the modernization program costs.

ORD runway question - the opening of the new 9C-27C, and closure of 14R-32L, are supposed to both be completed by 2020. But is the closure of 4L-22R supposed to be part of this (or follow it immediately) due to, say, the fact that they intersect? Closure of 4L-22R always sounded only like a vague long-term aspiration as the airfiled re-orients to an E-W focus, and I've never seen anything actually suggesting it was planned and certainly have never seen any year attached to it. In fact, I think I've even seen mentions of ORD riding off into the sunset as an 8-runway airfield.

However, I just noticed the below article from last summer that says Ginger Evans "has indicated it's likely the city will eventually close" 4L-22R. So has there ever been anything concrete suggesting it is already planned for the 2020s? Or is the idea that if a later 2nd or 3rd island concourse of a future western terminal encroaches on the path of 4L-22R then in that case it would have to be decommissioned?

Incidentally, there would seem to be one big upside to closing the runway - with slight taxiway shifting Concourse C could instantly accommodate more jumbo jets, or it could even be expanded with a perpendicular "finger" westward from its midpoint, or even an entirely new, parallel island concourse could be added to the west of Concourse C (at this point you could call it Concourse D, since the old "D" seems to have disappeared from T2), and Concourse E too could be extended due westward (while we're at it, make it more accessible by putting some kind of express corridor on the roof of E, like with moving sidewalks and limited access back to the main floor). In fact, these would presumably be cheaper options than actually building a new western terminal, if the need (physical, political, or otherwise) for a western terminal in the medium term is outweighed by its marginal cost over this C/D/E idea.

www.dailyherald.com/article/20150820/news/150829901

Just one note, that big old bad 32R reduced cancellations when strong north/northwest winds accured. The same goes for last Friday. 22L and 22R saved alot of the operation from cancelling. Ignoring crosswinds and only building east west runways is typical of the miss guided government policy we get these days. All aircraft have crosswind restrictions, not just small aircraft.

Aviation guys - are the crosswinds (diagonals) desirable equally for takeoffs and for landings? Or are they important mostly for landings, and a bit less important for takeoffs?

Both, 22L in particular has been used extensively for departures and almost never for arrivals. 4L-22R was used for both arrivals and departures extensively prior to the reconfiguration. Now, it's use is restricted by the configuration of the new runways. I personally have not used 4L-22R for a number of years and don't expect to unless surface winds are extraordinarily strong and favor the 4/22s.

UA Pilot

^ Thanks

So why are they closing the diagonals in the first place? Was it just a ruse (or necessary sacrifice) to obtain funding to construct the 4 east-west runways, and to re-route Irving Park Road, and to re-route the freight line, and to construct the 2 new control towers, and all the new taxiways, and to relocate the air freight terminals?

Or is it just too expensive to keep 10 runways officially open on an ongoing basis when only 7 or 8 are normally used?

Short answer, yes. The parallel configuration allows for the highest amount of traffic. Using either of the 4/22's reduces airport capacity, so their use is limited to specific situations. At some point the cost/benefit ratio becomes a factor and that apparently will be coming sooner rather than later. While crosswind limits are a factor, truth is the amount of time this would be limiting arrivals is very, very, very small. The benefits of the added daily capacity exceed that of the ability to continue ops in the limited events of extreme crosswinds.

While what you say is true, at this point I think they should leave the 22/4's and 32L in place until more capacity is needed. Those runways are a great option during high wind events and will save 100's of cancellations yearly. The 22/4 runways are pretty important for this area, even more than the 32L runway going by statistics.

Here's some usage info for all of the runways at ORD: ftp://public-ftp.agl.faa.gov/2015%20.../chapter_1.pdf

Thanks for that.....If you look at high wind statistics for Chicago the highest percentage of high wind fronts cause high winds out of the southwest/south or northwest/north, with some strong winds also coming off the lake from the northeast at times(but rarer). Those runways are needed for those events and if they take them out they will have to cancel alot if not all flights when we do have a high wind event from those directions. Maybe the city can pray that all future high winds are out of the west or east :)

Delta Gates @ ORD
 

After the merger between Delta and Northwest, why didn't the "New Delta" consolidate all their operations at ORD from the L concourse instead of T2? At one point in the 80s and 90s they occupied most of L, with the exception of some int'l departures. Seems like L was in better shape than where they are now in T2.

I'm going to preface this comment by saying I'm a huge proponent of modernizing O'Hare.

That disclaimer out of the way, and in light of the new package developments, is anyone else wondering how the heck and where the heck this stuff is going to go?

Let's start with the de-ice pads. Great concept, works really well at Pearson in Toronto, but are they talking one pad? Two pad's? Four pads? And where? Where can you put these pads that doesn't mean a huge detour for the departure points in both flows?

In a west-flow, expanding the 28R pad makes sense, but you're bounded by Mannheim to the east and the 22R RSA as well. Knock down the maintenance facility to the north? Or is it big enough as is? Stick some de-icing vehicles in some lanes and knock out a/c as they head to 22L and 28R full-length? What about 28R-N5 departures? Do they head all the way down to the 28R pad, get-deiced, and then taxi back west on N, stopping to let the GG or EE arrival traffic from 28C go past as they head to LL?

This is just south-side departures as well, what happens when 27C is built and they start on the 27L expansion? What about when you have theoretical 27L intersection departures? Build pads on the north-side? Combine the old 32R and Bravo Pads into a de-ice pad?

Expand the penalty box and turn it into a de-ice pad for east-flow departures from the north? They keep on talking about the expansion of these pads and I have yet to even *see* a conceptual drawing of where they'll go.

Now, for another head-scratcher. The talk of a 'cross-field taxiway system.' It's only logical that would mean taxiways that travel N/S. What's the closest place that you could route N/S taxiways in a straight line on either side of the terminal complex? If you built a another bridge north and west of the Alpha bridge going due north you could almost have a straight shot up from EE, up bravo, across 27L and up where the current TT/PP taxiways run...but they'll intersect 27L and future 27C.

If they run a connector up that way, is that intersection where you'll send off 27L west-flow intersection departures? Or is that the route south for west-flow 27C arrivals to cut behind 27L departures? Either way...is it that in a much better position than current Twy M?

That's on the east-side, let's think about the west-side of the terminal complex. Let's assume you don't knock out the T1 island. Where do you build a cross-field connector that makes any sense? Remember, enabling projects for 27C mean that the hanger complex between the 14's is going to have some buildings moved to the north-east, but essentially it's not going to get any smaller. That means that you can't build anything coming due south out of the 14L pad right now without snaking it...oh, and a crossfield connector is smack dab in the middle of 27C and 27L, so the whole argument of going to east flow/west flow as a means to reduce rwy crossings doesn't carry a lot of weight. You'd almost need end-around taxiways like you have at ATL, and you *can't* do that on the east side of the airport, and having them on the west-side of the airport doesn't do a whole lot better than Zulu/Tango routing they have now.

I'll be really curious to see the TAAM simulations and the new environmental impact study, since *none* of this stuff is in the original OMP EIS or the re-draft.

Plus, I haven't seen anything that showed an interim configuration change for the re-design of N5 and the first chunk of LL.

I know there's a ton of people way smarter than me working on it, but a lot of this doesn't pass the common sense test to me on first glance.

Either way, the folks at Ricondo are going to be earning their $$.

Overall the details have been pretty scarce lately but I'm not surprised since Evans has to negotiate with the carriers for everything and doesn't want to show her hand.

Seems we'll get more concrete info the middle of this year when they release the new master plan.

Passenger numbers continue to increase in 2016. Q1 statistics:

O'Hare: 17,015,992 +4.66% over Q1 2015

International +6.83%
Domestic +4.30%

Midway: 4,717,588 +3.74% over Q1 2015

^ Those are pretty big increases, whether for O'Hare or for any leading US airport. It will be interesting to see the upcoming summer season figures.

O'Hare international flights are growing and the A380 gates should be done in a few months. I wonder who will be first to bring one in? I know British, Lufthansa, Korean and Emirates all say they want to.

On the domestic side the regionals will upgrade all the older equipment to E175/E190/CR7/CR9 equipment within a few years and will park all the older 50 seaters in the desert.

By the way, I have seen AA 777-300's sitting at ORD several times lately.

Only bad thing really is LHR London is way down on volume mainly due to the middle east carriers taking traffic.

Speaking of international growth, EVA Air will be starting year-round service to Taipei in November. First at 4x weekly and then expected to be daily soon after. Chicago is really bulking up it's capacity to Asia/ME...

Beijing: 3x daily
Shanghai: 3x daily
Tokyo: 5x daily
Hong Kong: 2x daily
Seoul: 2x daily
Delhi: 1x daily
Dubai: 1x daily
Doha: 1x daily
Abu Dhabi: 1x daily
Amman: 1x daily
Taipei: 1x daily

In 2014 there was more passenger traffic to Tokyo than there was to Frankfurt and Toronto. Beijing and Hong Kong were both above Paris. London is still #1 by a wide margin.

You mean volume of ORD <--> LHR traffic? In other words, pax between ORD and the Middle East are transiting less through LHR and are instead flying the big gulf carriers? In which way would that be a bad thing -- less carrier competition for us to holiday in Europe I guess?

That's kind of a dark horse, but I assume it's on Royal Jordanian. It looks like Amman has a new Norman Foster terminal and is aiming to become another big hub for the Middle East. Indeed, for many routes it has a superior location for African destinations than the mega Gulf airports have.

Incidentally, I wonder, when the country named its flag carrier, why they didn't go with the usual syntax and just call it "Air Jordan"... ;)

Eh, it's not that strange. Royal Jordanian fly to Montreal, Detroit, New York, and Chicago. Much of the Muslim population in Chicago/Detroit originate from that part of the Middle East. They are also a convenient option to Israel given the lack of Tel Aviv service from Chicago. (although that might be changing soon if rumors are to be believed)