--- In BATN@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx, "4/23 Contra Costa Times" <batn@xxxx> wrote: Published Friday, April 23, 2004, in the Contra Costa Times Airport extension ready to take off By Guy Ashley Contra Costa Times OAKLAND -- Plying a mound of earth with gleaming silver shovels, local officials broke ground Thursday on a $110 million expansion of the south terminal at Oakland International Airport, the first step of a larger airport improvement project 14 years in the making. The project will add five boarding gates to accommodate a steady expansion in flight service that has both bucked post-Sept. 11 trends in aviation and made Oakland the country's second-fastest growing airport. "Our success has created a tremendous need to expand," said Steve Grossman, aviation director for the Port of Oakland, which operates the airport. The expansion will come in the way of a new arm jutting southward off the airport's current Terminal 2, which houses Oakland's hugely successful Southwest Airlines service. The project also will include a full renovation of the existing terminal and an overall expansion of security and baggage screening areas, to move passengers more efficiently in an era of heightened security and to better accommodate Southwest's rapid growth. Officials hope the terminal expansion will be completed by fall 2006. Starting this fall, construction also will begin on a new six-story parking garage directly in front of Oakland's two passenger terminals, which will link to the terminals via a pedestrian bridge. A BART shuttle service eventually will link directly to the garage structure. In anticipation of the garage project, airport officials already have reconfigured parking areas by moving long-term parking to an area that once was auxiliary parking, and expanding daily parking into the former long-term lot. David McAneny, senior project manager of the terminal expansion, said the airport is committed to seeing the projects through with minimal disruptions for passengers, noting that failure to do so would damage Oakland's reputation for convenience. The south terminal project is a departure from Oakland's original plan for a $1.4 billion overhaul of the entire airport. That vision ran directly into post-Sept. 11 mandates that expanded the airport's security needs, and economic doldrums that made it more difficult to pay for the entire project in one fell swoop. Oakland officials originally planned on expanding the two terminals upward, creating two two-story buildings served by a double-deck roadway. That plan, however, has been abandoned, and airport officials believe that eventually Oakland's north terminal will be expanded northward, using land vacated last year when United Airlines abandoned its East Bay maintenance facility. --- End forwarded message ---