Proposed Overhaul Includes New Terminal, Transit Center

A change is gonna come to San Diego International/Lindbergh Field (SAN); at least, that appears likely after the city council accepted a report this week calling for a total makeover of the busy airport.

The San Diego Union Tribune reports councilors voted their approval Monday to the plan, submitted by a panel of local officials led by San Diego Mayor Jerry Sanders. The plan -- approved 6-2 -- calls for the construction of a new passenger terminal, parking garages and a multimodal transit center connecting the airfield to the city center.

The new terminal would be constructed at the north end of the field -- near Interstate 5 -- with an underground train eventually ferrying passengers to existing gates at the south end. Until that subway is completed, buses would shuttle passengers between the two points.

Councilors who expressed misgivings about earlier expansion plans -- which called for a new multilevel parking garage near Terminal 2 -- hope the new arrangement will prevent that structure from being 'shoehorned' onto a plot of land near Harbor Drive.

"It would be a waste of money," said City Councilman Carl DeMaio of the proposed structure. Others say the garage would add to existing traffic problems on an already-clogged arterial road. Officials have not yet ruled on whether that structure will be built.

Sanders' panel was formed last year to find a compromise between the city and the San Diego County Regional Airport Authority, on how to best expand Lindbergh Field. The single-runway airport is expected to reach capacity by 2025.

An entirely new airport would be ideal, but San Diego has few options in that regard. Voters rejected in 2006 a plan to add commercial facilities to Marine Corps Air Station Miramar, after military officials made it clear they still had plans for that facility.

The Lindbergh plan next goes to the airport authority for consideration. If approved, work will begin on the expected 20-year expansion plan, which is projected to cost between $5 billion and $11 billion.

FMI: www.san.org/