A number of major airports have average taxi out times that well exceed that.

Also I'd much rather be on the ground rolling than circling endlessly over farm country waiting to land during poor weather east flow operations.

My understanding is that when it's used during peak times it will allow for a secondary east flow alignment that preserves departure capacity as well as maintains three arrival streams, which the previous scheme does not. I don't think the calculus is quite as simple as saying it only handles 5% without a greater context of what that means to operations. Less arrival and departure delays in poor weather benefit the entire national air system.

That is what she said, but this should have already been in the works years ago. The only problem is that terminal expansion might cause one of the big two airlines to dehub ORD. Make it worth their while to stay. Stop charging the highest landing fees of any major airport in the US. Tag fees to what ATL does if you want to grow. Also give tax credits(storm event credits) :) for deicing to offset that massive cost that even effects the southern airports when they have ice storms/snow. Then maybe ATL and DFW won't implode when the weather gets bad since they will invest in more deice trucks:). Might as well go completely socialist!!!

It also takes a lot more fuel to fly then to taxi as they can shut engines down when on taxi.

Neither United or American would dehub ORD. To do so would be tantamount to the unconditional surrender of the entire Chicago market at this point.

It will be interesting to see what Evans proposes. The city has threatened to finance construction of the western terminal without the airlines permission before to get them to agree to the now completing phase of the OMP. Dangling that again plus the prospect of loosing gates in a duopolistic situation is going to be potent leverage. My general expectation is that it will be the construction of T6, expansion of T3, and commitment to the final round of airfield improvements (though maybe phased). The only way I could see the western terminal actually getting built was if it turned into a new international terminal connected airside while T5 was converted to domestic only.

re: gate capacity
 

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/c...016-story.html

Although then any passenger checking luggage, or even merely needing assistance from an agent at check-in, could enter at the opposite terminal only if his airline was operating a second bank of check-in counters at that terminal, and I wonder if even the megacarriers would consider it worth it to have such a running cost.

Actually no part of the tunnel is under the runway (the tunnel is basically east-west and so is the runway; QED) - however it does pass under a taxiway connector near the runway. No matter though; it is just as much a thrill driving Cargo Road now (and Irving Park Road, upon its reopening after the emergency closure last summer).

You might be thinking of the South Access Road tunnel, which does run under a taxiway roughly parallel to 10R-28L. This tunnel is at Post Office Road, and does, in fact run directly under the new runway closer to the east end. It's inside the fence line, and not open to general public traffic.

Site for the CONRAC is being cleared/excavated now. My view wasn't the best but the site work for the big new Aeroterm cargo faculty looked well underway also.

what is the Aeroterm?

Really only the kiosks are needed, with the option to pay in advance for the checked bag. The airlines could just gate-check any luggage for such passengers.

It's a convenience for the airlines to handle the checked bag between the counter and the gate, but it's not strictly necessary.

http://www.aeroterm.com/chicago/site.html

http://www.aeroterm.com/chicago/images/pic_site.jpg

Aeroterm Land Usage
 

After looking at the aeroterm picture, I just realized how much land was available for this project. I'm surprised that I've never heard any mention of using that real estate for a passenger terminal(s). It could easily connect to the existing ATS, it's closer to downtown and it can take advantage of the already built eastern airport access and amenities. It's probably because a cargo terminal is cheap to build and we'll never see new passenger terminals be built again in my lifetime :(

A huge cargo terminal is being built because there is huge cargo demand at ORD, particularly after (and because of) the port strike on the west coast.

Mid-field is the optimal place for a large new passenger terminal anyway and no major expansion is being built that isn't the western terminal which has been long promised.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/c...02-column.html

how about 30 minutes

The LL taxiway work has been throwing a wrench into the flow well before 10R opened. Once it's complete next year the taxi-in times will probably fall into the projected range.

China Eastern today (11NOV15) opened reservation for planned new US service, where it plans 3 weekly Shanghai Pu Dong – Chicago flights. First flight is scheduled on 18MAR16, using Boeing 777-300ER aircraft.

--

Another new international carrier and more service to China.

Wow! That's an amazing 3 flight to Shanghai on 3 different carriers. Incredible!! And I believe 7 total flights a day to China from ORD.

Yep, next summer we'll have 3 flights on 3 different carriers to both Beijing and Shanghai, plus 2 more daily flights to Hong Kong. Capacity from Chicago to China is almost as much as to England.

Fares are definitely competitive though, suggesting they're struggling to fill all the capacity. Last week I saw United had some round trips to Beijing for as low as $603 all-in. If it wasn't for the low fuel prices they'd all probably be losing their shirt on these routes. (and they might be anyway)