A while back we blogged about the fate of the grandly-named Los Angeles Intercontinental Airport, located in Palmdale, some 60 miles north of Los Angeles (If You Can’t Build It They Won’t Come, October 2, 2008, https://gideonstrumpet.info/?=127 ) It was created (mostly on paper) in the early 1970s when the City of Los Angeles blew some $100,000,000 acquiring 17,500 acres of high desert land for a new airport to supplement LAX. What actually happened was that in spite of several tries by various plucky airlines, that airport went nowhere, and Los Angeles eventually gave up on it. Those 17,500 are still out there, performing the vital function of holding the rest of the world together, and the public got hosed to the tune of $100,000,000 (in early 1970s dollars) and God knows how much more in carrying costs, to no avail.
Today’s dispatches bring news of two more similar attempts. First at bat is the – ta,da! – Northwest Florida Beaches International airport near Panama City, in the Florida panhandle. Susan Stellin, Airport Built, It’s Time to see if the Traffic Comes, N.Y. Times, March 10, 2010, at p. B6. At least this one is being built with some $300 million in private funds by the St. Joe Company in an effort to develop the nearby area. It is evidently being build on the if-you-build-it-they-will-come theory – the hope is that tourism will grow once a convenient air service to the area is established.
And over in Mito, Japan, the locals are building a new “no frills” Ibaraki airport. Hiroko Tabuchi, In Japan, No-Frills Airport Lures Bargain Players, N.Y. Times, March 11, 2010, at p. B8. No jetways, and possibly no baggage handling at this one. No tractors either; the planes will have to taxi to and from the gates on their own. Two flight per day; one to Seoul, South Korea, and the other to Kobe, Japan. Low cost landing fees. This airport is publicly financed to the tune of $243 million. At least the Japanese are up front about the fact that they expect this airport to be losing money at the outset — $221,000 in its first year. After that it’s a wing and a prayer.
The remarkable feature of both these projects is that they do not appear to be using eminent domain to acquire land. The Panama City Airport appears to be built on land already owned by the St. Joe Company, and the one in Mito, … Well, that one is in Japan where eminent domain is simply not used except in rare cases of dire necessity. The Tokyo Narita airport was built on expropriated land, and the authorities have never heard the end of it – what with occasional riots by the descendants of the farmers whose land was taken, occurring sporadically until this day. Those folks take eminent domain very seriously.
Will it all work out? Will they come if you build it? Stay tuned and find out.
Follow up. When we named this post “It’s the Same the Whole World Over,” we weren’t just whistling Dixie. The Los Angeles Times reports that the same thing is happening in China, only on a much larger scale. David Pierson, Airports Lack a Key Element: Passengers, L.A. Times, March 13, 2010, at p. A1. For example, the $57 million Libo airport built to accommodate 220,000 passengers annually is so underutilized that airport employees work part-time and lights are turned off some of the time. “Experts say up to two-thirds of the nation’s airports are losing money.”