Recently the media got a sneak peak of the $600 million (Charlotte Douglas International) CLT Airport Concourse A Expansion project. CLT airport is embarking on a 370,000-square-foot expansion and renovation of its main terminal lobby to keep up with continued growth and also accommodate passenger needs; as over 44 million passengers travel through CLT annually.
The CLT Airport Concourse A Expansion project is only part of a 10-year renovation program which will cost at least $2.5 billion and it includes the renovation of all the concourses, with doubled sizes to reduce congestion; upgrading security and baggage systems technologies; providing way finding designs that keep passengers from getting lost; and the repositioning of the ticketing and check-in areas, as part of the changes listed in the makeover plans for the terminal.
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The first phase of the CLT Airport Concourse A expansion project was a $200-million project which was completed in 2018 and it covered the addition of nine gates on the north side of Concourse. Now the phase II of the Concourse A expansion, will add 10 gates to the north end of the concourse and after the completion of this phase, the terminal and main lobby will be further extended by an additional 90 feet.
The airport officials also gave a tour of the upper level of CLT Airport’s terminal expansion, which still has about 25% of renovation work left to complete the project. According to the developers, all new spaces will be ready for use by late spring next year. This expansion project is being developed through a joint venture between the Atlanta-based Holder Construction and Charlotte firms Edison Foard, called Holder-Edison Foard-Leeper; while R.J. Leeper Construction, serves as the general contractor.
Jack Christine, the airport’s chief operating officer was happy with the progress of the CLT Airport Concourse A expansion and he also pointed out that the portion which was opened to the media for the tour only represents two-thirds of the expansion.
Christine also mentioned that the CLT Concourse A expansion, featuring 10 new gates, was paused by a year to see whether the pandemic would affect the demand too much for expansion. But even after the Covid pandemic caused a large decline in airline ticket sales, the airport terminal still remained undersized.
