May 13, 2008

SFO will resurrect 'ghost terminal' within next 2 years

By Michael Manekin / Bay Area News Group

The national economy may be tanking, but business at San Francisco International Airport is soaring high enough to bring life back to the dead.

The airport's Terminal 2 - commonly referred to as the "ghost terminal" - soon will be resurrected to meet the rocketing demand for domestic airline travel.

Terminal 2, the airport's former hub for international travel, once was the busiest terminal in the Bay Area's busiest airport. But when SFO opened its new billion-dollar international terminal six years ago, Terminal 2 was left for dead.

The former international terminal was slated for remodeling and reuse, but air travel plummeted in the wake of the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, leaving Terminal 2 a shell of its former self - a cavernous hallway between two busy terminals.

Now 610,000 square feet of void soon will resound again with the bustle of airline passengers, airport officials said Monday.

"It's nice and quiet now, but it will be nice to have passengers here again," airport spokesman Mike McCarron said. "I'm really looking forward to getting the terminal remodeled."

The new Terminal 2 will be a hub for domestic air travel, providing a home for Virgin America and potentially for Southwest and Jet Blue, airport officials said. The increased competition among those particular airlines has generated the business necessary to renovate the terminal.

"We've had to fast-track (the development) because the growth is happening so quickly," airport director John Martin said.

While SFO's overall passenger levels still fall below the pre-Sept. 11 years, the airport's total number of passengers has increased by 22 percent since 2003, airport officials said.

The renovated terminal, which is expected to open at the end of 2010, "will certainly be setting the new standard for the airport," he added.

The design of the building will be "distinctly San Francisco," said Martin, featuring the kind of upscale retail and gourmet food available in the airport's two other domestic terminals.

In addition, many elements of "green" design will be incorporated. The terminal's builders aim to use green building materials and regional products, while its designers are planning to reduce carbon emissions by 12,000 tons annually, use high-efficiency lighting and recycle much of the water used in the facility.

"We want to do this as environmentally friendly as possible," said McCarron, who added that the terminal's price tag comes in at $383 million.

Designers have not yet completed their plans for the building, but airport officials already have green-lighted the beginning of construction, kicking off the building's redesign with a seismic retrofit in several weeks. By summer or fall, crews will begin remodeling the building's exterior.

While the remodeling will eventually close the terminal to foot traffic, pedestrians still will be able to walk between Terminals 1 and 3 by way of a covered sidewalk outside the terminal, McCarron said.

The revamped Terminal 2 also will boast a new air traffic control tower. The building will continue to house much of the airport's nerve center, including its communications office and emergency operations center.

Terminal 2, which was constructed in 1954, is the oldest of all the terminals in use at the airport. Terminal 1, the next-oldest terminal, will be remodeled once the Terminal 2 project is completed, airport officials said.