When planes land at O'Hare, trip just getting started
Tom Cablk was on one of American Airlines' new nonstop flights from Philadelphia to Bensenville last week and, jeez, the ride in from the runway took so long he could've used a sandwich.
The Boeing 737 that Cablk was aboard actually touched down at O'Hare International Airport, not Bensenville, of course. And the flight landed early. But the new runway it used is the farthest from the terminals. It's on land formerly inside the village of Bensenville.
Cablk, a frequent flier, contacted the Tribune the next day to say, "Last night provided a good example of why the promises to improve timeliness at O'Hare are not being fulfilled.''
Recent articles that Cablk had read in the newspaper about the taxi-in time from the new east-west runway, called 10 Right, to the gate being 20 minutes weren't true in his case, he said. His trip from runway to gate last Monday on American Flight 1333 took even longer — 50 percent longer.
The 760-mile flight lasted 1 hour and 48 minutes from wheels up in Philadelphia to wheels down at O'Hare, according to a flight-tracking service. But the final 5 to 7 miles taxiing on the ground from 10 Right to the gate ate up an additional 30 minutes, according to monitoring by flightaware.com. And that's without stop-and-go, gridlock-level congestion on the airfield that would occur if flight volumes grow at O'Hare in the years ahead.
Students learn in Geometry 101 that the shortest distance between two points is a straight line. The Federal Aviation Administration and the airlines employ that principle in flight on a more sophisticated basis to calculate the great-circle shortest distance between two points on the surface of Earth.
But on the tarmac at the redesigned O'Hare airfield, the taxiing route is like finding your way out of a corn maze.
"It's so far to the gate, sometimes some of us older guys feel like stopping to use the (restroom)," said a veteran captain at a major airline.
American has added three minutes to its schedule for arrivals at O'Hare as a result of the longer taxi-in times from 10 Right, airline spokeswoman Leslie Scott said.
"We're keeping an eye on that and will adjust as necessary,'' Scott said.
Cablk said the half-hour drive to the gate "set a new record here for me. All this taxiing, west to east, east to west and back again west to east, for runways that are supposed to reduce travel times.''
The newest runway and two taxiways cost $516 million to build, according to the city. The runway is expected to handle up to 125 arrivals a day, or 5 percent of all daytime flights annually over the next five years, according to the FAA. Its usage is planned to increase after 2020 when O'Hare's sixth east-west parallel runway is tentatively slated to open, officials said.
City aviation officials have been promising for years that O'Hare's dismal record for flights arriving and departing on time would improve when the $10 billion-plus expansion project is eventually completed, now expected in about 2021. They attributed part of the delays passengers endure to the challenges of operating the airport in an active construction zone.
A major project that started in April and will continue until at least next July involves redesigning a taxiway, called Lima Lima, near one of the entrances to the terminals. The change is aimed at improving efficiency for planes entering and coming off some of the new runways, city aviation officials said, adding that the first phase of the $25 million project is roughly halfway done. Work areas will be shifted for subsequent phases, resulting in different impacts on airline operations for about the next nine months, officials said.
The taxiway is near another taxiway, called Alpha 17, where three streams of arriving planes converge, said O'Hare tower controllers, who are concerned about the ongoing construction.
That spot on the airfield near Alpha 17 is "like the Kennedy/Edens Junction and you throw in the Eisenhower too,'' a controller said.
Due to Lima Lima construction, the captain of American Flight 1333 was directed to take an even longer, more circuitous route than normal procedures call for, according to the FAA. The plane's route from 10 Right last Monday night was confirmed, turn by turn from one taxiway to the next, by the FAA.
The normal taxi route from new runway 10 Right to the gate follows parts of three taxiways to wind around one runway instead of crossing over it, which would create potential collision risks.
But the taxi route then requires a turn to directly cross a different runway — staying behind planes that are taking off on that runway — followed by another turn, and then another runway to cross over, and a little more taxiing until reaching the core of the airport, where a left or right turn is required, depending on what concourse the plane is assigned.
At that T-intersection, called Tango 9, before making a turn, "Our pilot said that we had traveled over six to seven miles so far,'' Cablk said. But they weren't there yet.
Cablk, who lives in Crystal Lake, would've been closer to home if his plane had instead landed on the far north runway that opened at O'Hare in 2008, and if he were allowed to jump out and walk. The taxi-in time from that runway, averaging 12 to 14 minutes depending on the gate location, was the longest until runway 10 Right opened on Oct. 15, the FAA said.
Scott, the American spokeswoman, said it is too early for the airline to evaluate airfield performance now that five of six planned east-west parallel runways are operational at O'Hare. "We're not ready to provide specific information on the new runway, as we're still gathering data,'' she said.
Officials at United Airlines said the taxi times during the less than three weeks since 10 Right opened are about what the airline expected. The taxi-in times to United gates have averaged 16 to 18 minutes, United spokesman Luke Punzenberger said. The taxi distance to United gates is shorter than the distance to American's gates, and the Lima Lima construction is not as much of a factor.
When American Flight 1333 finally reached the fork in the taxiway requiring a left or right turn near the terminal core, a right turn onto taxiway Bravo would have taken the plane directly to its gate in Terminal 3 on the south end of the terminal buildings. But the Chicago Department of Aviation had closed a portion of Bravo because of Lima Lima construction, said FAA spokesman Tony Molinaro.
So the plane had to hang a left and taxi clockwise all the way around the terminals to reach Gate K5 at the south end of the terminal complex, Molinaro said.
City aviation spokesman Owen Kilmer said short-term pain will lead to "long-term benefits for passengers, including reduced taxi times and a more efficient process for aircraft landing at O'Hare.''
Flight 1333 finally arrived at the gate — 2 hours and 18 minutes after taking off from Philly — at 7:11 p.m., which, thanks to all the extra "block time'' airlines build into their schedules to compensate for delays, congestion and inefficiencies, was only two minutes after its scheduled gate arrival time. Flights arriving within 15 minutes of the scheduled arrival time are considered on time by the U.S. Department of Transportation.
"After all that wasted time, technically, we were still on time,'' Cablk said.
Contact Getting Around at jhilkevitch@tribpub.com or c/o the Chicago Tribune, 435 N. Michigan Ave., Chicago, IL 60611; on Twitter @jhilkevitch; and at www.facebook.com/jhilkevitch
Copyright © 2015, Chicago Tribune
- O'Hare International Airport
- Federal Aviation Administration
- Travel
- Jon Hilkevitch
- American Airlines
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