Extreme Airports // 11ATLANTA
city who died in February 1971, and on
July 1 the same year it became William
B Hartfield International Airport when
Eastern Airlines launched nonstop flights
to Mexico and Barbados. Traffic continued
to increase and Delta added rotundas to
the ends of concourses E and F, but the lack
of space still became woefully apparent.
By the end of the 1970s throughput in the
‘jet age’ terminal was double its design
capacity and the pressure for room was
so intense that airlines were forced to find
inventive ways of accommodating aircraft,
including double parking and gate sharing.
To meet forecasts of continuing increases
in demand, construction of yet another
new passenger building began in 1977,
although it took four years to complete.
United Airlines and Trans World Airlines
downscaled their operations at ATL in
1979 while the work was progressing,
but the remaining 15 carriers didn’t andstill struggled to maintain an efficient
operation in the run-up to the opening of
the new complex. In 1980, Lufthansa and
British Caledonian Airways launched the
first services between Europe and Atlanta,
taking advantage of a newly completed
federal inspection station in Concourse E;
neither would have long to wait before they
could move to the much-improved facilities.Superlatives
The world’s largest passenger terminal
was completed in 1981. The $500m
midfield complex was designed to
accommodate 55m ppa and covered 2.5m
sq ft (230,000m²). It had symmetrical
northern and southern halls to the west
housing check-in, baggage reclaim and
ground transportation. These were linked
to five concourses – T adjacent to the
main building, and remote gate areas A,
B, C and D which were accessed via an
underground ‘Plane Train’ transit system
or a pedestrian walkway. A modular
design was selected for the facilities to
allow for expansion to the east as traffic
increased. A station for the MARTA (Metro
Atlanta Rapid Transit Authority) railway
system was also included in the main
building but the connection to the system
was not finished until 1988, seven years
after the other work was completed.
Each of the concourses was colour-
coded to aid navigation – T (handling
international flights) was orange, while
A (Delta Air Lines) was red, B (Delta and
Eastern) was purple, C (Eastern plus
commuter carriers) was blue and D
(Northwest, Braniff, Piedmont, Frontier,
Ozark and Republic) was green. The ‘Plane
Train’ vehicles that moved passengers
between the concourses were automated
and had an unusual electronic voice
nicknamed Hal (after the computer in
2001: A Space Odyssey). Its vocabulary
included the message: “This vehicle is
leaving the station. Please hold on. The
colour-coded maps and signs in this
vehicle match the station colours. PleaseABOVE LEFT: A
transit system
connects the main
terminal to the
gates. (Renato
Serra Fonseca)
ABOVE: The
boarding areas are
wide and spacious.
(Renato Serra
Fonseca)
ABOVE RIGHT:
An underground
walkway parallels
the transit system
and links the
concourses.
(Renato Serra
Fonseca)
LEFT: Delta jets taxi
to the gates as the
sun starts to go
down. (Toshihiko
Takamizawa)
BELOW LEFT:
Concourse
F handles
international
flights. (Renato
Serra Fonseca)
BELOW LEFT: The
tallest air traffic
control tower
in the USA was
completed at
the same time as
the fifth runway.
(AirTeamImages.
com/Bruce
Leibowitz)AIRPORT FACILITIES ( 2017 )
Area 4,700 acres (1,902ha)
Terminal complex156.1 acres / 6.8m sq ft
(63.2ha)
Gates 209
Aircraft parking 192 (152 domestic, 40
international)
Air Train transit
system11 four-car vehicles, 3
miles (4.8km) of track,
200,000 passengers
per day
Concessions 263 (114 food and
beverage, 90 retail, 3
duty-free, 56 services)
Cargo 29 aircraft parking
positions, 29.8 acres
/ 1.3m sq ft (12.1 ha) of
warehouses
Parking Domestic – 30,
spaces (10,000 covered)
International – 1,100, plus
2,600 park-and-ride
Car hire 67.5 acres (27ha),
8,700 parking spaces
Employees 63,
Economic impact $34.8bn per annum6-13_Atlanta.indd 11 11/05/2018 14: