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Comment by coldcode | Hacker News Reader

Building an airport always is. Often it takes more money and a few decades to appreciate it. D/FW airport was a nightmare when it was built but it's pretty nice today. Denver's airport had tons of issues as well.

Then again this seems on a much higher level of disaster, but should be familiar to anyone building large government software systems.

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Not a fan of DFW's terminal setup and roads. All that space and that tangle of off-ramps and on-ramps and bridges is the best they could do?

Satellite shot: https://goo.gl/peXr25

I think one of the key problems with the overall layout was the desire to run a toll road that connects TX-183 to the northern highways through the airport, and to use this road as the two entrances.

They still could have designed the individual terminal layouts better though, as the road and garage layout of Terminal D shows.

Hmm, this multi-terminal, spread-out, "park right by the gate" design reminded me of Kansas City International airport. Turns out this was a trend in airport design in the early 1970s - KCI opened in 1972 and DFW in 1973. TWA, among others, pushed this design.

Interestingly they used a similar approach at Berlin Tegel airport, with the current terminal building opened in 1975 (which is supposed to be closed down after the airport featured here is ready).

Denver still has the issue that it's a 20 mile drive from downtown out of some misguided belief that the city was just going to instantly grow out to it.

That seems to be slooowwwwwwly improving, but honestly the biggest improvement for me will be the light rail from downtown.

And all the crazy artwork. The conspiracy theorists go nuts over it.

http://mysteryoftheiniquity.com/2011/03/20/denver-internatio...

I was really intrigued by the comment about how the Queen of England bought property near the airport which is apparently proof that the United States has never been an independent country but a pawn of good ol' England.

I love conspiracy theorists that see anything marked New World, and then immediately start in on how the new world order wants to kill/chip all of us. As if the existence of an elite group of puppet masters is just an established fact, and it's just the end result that the group wants that is up for debate.

Delusions are terrifying.

I had no idea there were so many conspiracies about the airport, despite the fact that I fly out of it all the time. http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Denver_Airport_conspiracy_theor... debunks several, though all it can really say about the art is, "Huh, yeah, that's weird. So what?" which isn't particularly dispositive.

That demon horse scares the crap out of me, though.

> "That demon horse scares the crap out of me, though"

We call him "Blucifer". He killed his creator (really -- a piece of the sculpture fell on the artist's leg and severed an artery.)

http://www.slate.com/blogs/atlas_obscura/2014/03/17/the_blue...

At least they're finally building a light rail link to downtown Denver...

Honestly it's a PITA when you fly, but how often do you fly? I'd rather the airport be far from downtown than have the approach/departure routes right over populated neighborhoods. That gets really annoying really quickly.

> Honestly it's a PITA when you fly, but how often do you fly?

I was a Delta Gold Medallion flyer for years (50k+ miles), and couple of times flirted with Platinum (75k+ miles). So...basically on a flight a couple of times a week, every week. There are large numbers of us. Denver is a pain in the ass.

A couple of times a week? That doesn't really add up. I flew London to San Francisco and back just once a month - not several times a week - for a year and that was 130k miles.

Atlanta to Charlotte is about 215 miles. Atlanta to Tampa is 415. Atlanta to Denver is about 1200. Not everyone's commute is half way around the world.

Flying into Colorado Springs is a bit sketchy, there is often turbulence from the mountains when you're descending. I wouldn't be surprised if DIA being located so far east has something to do with that.

DIA was built so far away due to complaints of noise from the locals. The distance was intentional, however dumb.

When you build an airport near the city, it becomes impossible to expand. San Diego is a good example of this, a single-runway airport that's surrounded by the bay, I-5, the Marine Corps Recruit Depot, and a residential neighborhood. It's running near capacity and impossible to expand. There's simply nowhere to go.

Tijuana!

Actually, I thought it was just a proposal to link the airport with a foot bridge to the U.S., but it sounds like it is already under construction:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cross_Border_Xpress http://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/news/2015/feb/16/skybrid...

They can expand into the water, adding an extra East-West strip.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Artificial_island_air...

Ordinarily yes, but the bay might not be wide enough to fill in part of it, especially when you're trying to fit aircraft carriers through it.

That's unlikely an option due to North Island, though.

DIA was also designed to be a high volume hub airport with a huge number of fights and massive expansion capacity without running into noise issues. I believe the vast majority of passengers are changing flights at DIA and never leave the airport. You can switch most flights without changing terminals.

DIA was built far out specifically for noise and expansion -- with the understanding/hope that the city would never get particularly close to it.

The big mistake was not connecting it to the city's light rail sooner.

The road is a high-volume direct route and they are adding a rail line that goes directly to the airport. It's trivial to drive there and wouldn't be much different than if the airport was closer.

Even if Denver doesn't grow to the airport, I don't see the downside of having an airport a few miles out of town.

In my opinion Denver is a shitshow and my least favorite airport to fly into. I actively avoid layovers there.

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