LaGuardia Airport's Makeover Detailed in New PBS NOVA Doc

Summary

All Of It: LaGuardia Airport's Transformation Detailed in PBS NOVA Documentary

Episode Title: LaGuardia Airport's Makeover Detailed in New PBS NOVA Doc
Host: Alison Stewart
Guest: Joby Lubman, Writer and Producer of PBS's NOVA Special "Extreme Airport Engineering"
Release Date: February 4, 2025

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Introduction to LaGuardia Airport’s Transformation

In this episode of All Of It, host Alison Stewart delves into the extensive overhaul of LaGuardia Airport in Queens, New York. Once notorious as one of the world's worst air travel hubs, LaGuardia has undergone a remarkable transformation, reinstating its status as a top-tier airport. The discussion is anchored around the new PBS NOVA documentary, "Extreme Airport Engineering," which chronicles the ambitious eight-year renovation project.

Alison Stewart opens the conversation by highlighting the dire state of LaGuardia in 2014, citing a poignant remark from then Vice President Joe Biden:

“It’s unacceptable.”
[01:05]

Joby Lubman, the documentary’s writer and producer, echoes this sentiment by describing the airport's reputation for poor passenger service and structural inefficiencies.

Importance of LaGuardia to Queens and New York City

Alison Stewart asks Joby Lubman to explain the significance of LaGuardia Airport within the local economy and its cultural impact on Queens:

“It’s a huge employer for the local area and obviously massively important hub for getting people into New York City.”
[02:07]

Lubman elaborates on the historical context, referencing Mayor LaGuardia’s determination in the 1930s to establish a municipal airport close to New York City, emphasizing its longstanding role as a critical infrastructure component.

Problems with the Old LaGuardia Airport

The conversation shifts to the myriad issues plaguing the old LaGuardia Airport. Joby Lubman outlines several key problems:

“It had very poor people flow. It was very congested. There was not enough seating, had really kind of antiquated heating and cooling.”
[03:35]

Additional challenges included:

• Inadequate Infrastructure: Single taxiways causing flight delays due to tarmac congestion.

  “Aircraft couldn’t push back from their gates as readily as they needed to because of congestion on the tarmac.”
  [04:07]

• Passenger Experience: Long wait times, confusing hallways, and inefficient layout leading to a frustrating travel experience.

Renovation Process and Solutions

The comprehensive renovation involved redesigning two of LaGuardia’s three terminals and restoring the art deco Terminal A. Lubman provides an in-depth look at the engineering marvels and strategic planning that facilitated the transformation:

“They moved everything back by 600ft towards the highway, which freed up 40 acres airside, allowing them to make these dual taxiways.”
[07:08]

Key Improvements:

• Satellite Design: Introduction of satellite concourses surrounding the terminals, enabling planes to park along the edges with multiple access points to runways.

  “They have gates all the way around the edges of these satellites, concourses. And the important thing is that the aircraft have multiple ways to get to the runway.”
  [07:10]

• Dual Taxiways: Implementation of dual taxiways to eliminate previous bottlenecks, significantly reducing flight delays.

• Phased Construction: Operating the renovation without halting airport operations by meticulously phasing the construction—building new capacities before decommissioning old ones.

  “They built new capacity, a new concourse, for example, and only then tore down the old capacity.”
  [09:00]

Addressing Geographic and Climate Challenges

LaGuardia’s unique geographic location posed significant challenges. Bordered by the Grand Central Parkway, the East River, and Flushing Bay, the design had to maximize limited space while ensuring resilience against environmental threats.

“LaGuardia Airport would fit into Central Park with 150 acres to spare.”
[07:29]

Climate Resilience: In response to Superstorm Sandy’s 2012 flooding, the renovation included:

• Enhanced Drainage Systems: Upgraded pump houses elevated above flood levels to effectively manage stormwater.

  “They had to completely revamp all of the drainage system and the pump houses.”
  [11:09]

• Deep Foundations: Installation of steel piles filled with reinforced concrete reaching bedrock to anchor buildings, preventing structural uplift during flooding.

  “They had to anchor those with hundreds and hundreds of these massive deep steel piles right down deep into the bedrock.”
  [12:00]

• Elevated Structures: Concourse buildings constructed on stilts to withstand potential floodwaters without sustaining damage.

  “The bottom floor, the ground floor could not be, is just open, allowing flood water to flow through.”
  [10:49]

Listener Feedback and Perspectives

The episode features listener calls providing diverse perspectives on the renovated LaGuardia Airport.

Manish from Garden City shares his positive experience:

“The airport is beautiful. The inside of it is amazing. It makes you want to actually hang out. All the restaurants, all the open space. Walking to your terminal, you can see the outside, you can see the bay. It’s almost like a Zen garden kind of thing.”
[15:09]

Conversely, Sarah expresses frustration with the airport’s layout, despite the renovations:

“You go through security and you start to walk, and you walk and you walk and you walk past shops and you walk past restaurants ... It takes forever to get to the actual plane.”
[16:21]

Joby Lubman acknowledges these concerns, noting that such issues are common in major airports due to their vast scale:

“That sounds like a lot of airports I know. And yes, I'd say that's probably quite common for all major airports.”
[17:32]

Challenges During Construction and Filming

The production of the documentary itself faced numerous hurdles, as detailed by Joby Lubman and caller Michael—the director of photography.

Logistical Hurdles:

• Weather Conditions: Severe snowstorms and power outages complicated filming schedules.

  “We had to deal with the snowstorms and power and, you know, and.”
  [18:37]

• Operational Complexity: Coordinating construction activities without disrupting ongoing airport operations required meticulous planning.

  “They had to build new capacity while keeping the old capacity up and running.”
  [07:29]

Critical Moments:

Lubman recounts specific instances where the project's success hinged on timely construction:

“They had to build this before the roadways could continue for the arrivals and departures roadways.”
[20:03]

Safety Enhancements in New LaGuardia

Safety was a paramount concern throughout the renovation. Post the miraculous "Miracle on the Hudson" flight incident, measures were taken to mitigate similar risks:

• Bird Strike Prevention: Efforts to minimize bird interference included stringent waste management to eliminate attractants and removal of nests near runways.

  “They had to be incredibly careful, incredibly conscious of attracting too many seabirds to the area.”
  [23:38]

• Optimized Air Traffic Control: The new air traffic control tower features inclined surfaces for comprehensive visibility across terminals and runways, enhancing surveillance and management of aircraft movements.

  “They had to design the airport with these kind of inclined surfaces on the building. It’s quite distinctive.”
  [23:42]

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Conclusion

The renovation of LaGuardia Airport stands as a testament to modern engineering and strategic planning, transforming a beleaguered transportation hub into a model of efficiency and aesthetic appeal. While the project succeeded in addressing many of the structural and operational flaws of the old LaGuardia, listener feedback indicates that passenger experience improvements, particularly in navigating the airport, remain areas for future enhancement.

Joby Lubman emphasizes the significance of LaGuardia’s transformation not just for Queens but for the broader New York City community, underpinning its role as a vital economic and cultural artery. The PBS NOVA documentary "Extreme Airport Engineering" offers an insightful exploration of this monumental project, capturing both its challenges and triumphs.

For those interested in the intricate details of large-scale infrastructure projects and their impact on everyday life, this episode provides a comprehensive overview of LaGuardia Airport's remarkable makeover.

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Note: Timestamps correspond to the transcript provided and are included to reference specific moments within the episode.

Transcript

[Progressive Insurance]

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[WNYC Studios]

Listener supported WNYC Studios.

[Alison Stewart]

Welcome back to all of it. I'm Alison Stewart. And unlike our last discussion, defying gravity is really not as simple as grabbing your broomstick. That's right. We're talking about air travel. Specifically, we're taking a look at how LaGuardia Airport in Queens went from being one of the world's worst air travel hubs to one of the best. Back in 2014, the situation at LaGuardia was bad enough to prompt then Vice President Biden to say this.

[Joe Biden]

It's unacceptable.

[Joby Lubman]

LaGuardia has the worst passenger service in the world. As I said, not because it was workers, because it doesn't have a structure. You wait too long, hallways don't make sense. You all know it.

[Alison Stewart]

But after a massive undertaking to completely redesign two of its three terminals, plus a smaller facelift to reimagine the art deco terminal at Terminal A, the renovation is complete. It took eight years and 8,007,000 workers, 72,000 tons of steel, and almost 600,000 tons of concrete. Joining me now to talk about the new documentary from PBS's Nova called Extreme Airport Engineering, which covers the ambitious project from start to finish, please welcome one of the film's writers and producer, Joby Lubman. Hi, Joby.

[Joby Lubman]

Hey, Alison. How you doing?

[Alison Stewart]

I am doing well. Before we get into the construction itself, can you explain how an air travel hub like LaGuardia fits into the local economy, economy, and local culture of Queens? And then how does it fit into.

[Caller]

The global economy, economy?

[Joby Lubman]

Well, it's a huge employer for the local area and obviously massively important hub for getting people into New York City. It's incredibly close into Manhattan just across the river, right? So I remember reading a story about Mayor LaGuardia back in the 30s, and he said he was flying, he had a ticket to New York, but he was flown to Newark and he got out and he said, no, no, I'm getting back in. Take me to New York City. And so he's making a point that there was no municipal airport close to New York City. He had to go to Newark. I think that's in New Jersey. Right. So LaGuardia Airport became crucial hub for getting people in and out of New York in the 30s and in the 40s, unfortunately, of course, they added onto it, they developed it, but it just didn't keep up with modern times, as you guys probably know better than I do. It kind of fell by the wayside a little bit. Became very much unloved. But, you know, it never stopped being an important employer for the area. Important kind of cultural hub for Queens as it is today.

[Caller]

All right, let's talk about the major problems the old LaGuardia had. What were the problems with old LaGuardia that this massive project aimed to fix?

[Joby Lubman]

Well, like I say, since the 30s, when the airport, you know, really kind of found its feet on that little outcrop of land on the east river, they, the authorities had sort of added little bits on. They changed things around. They'd added new terminals here and there, but it wasn't really joined up. It was kind of had eventually kind of came to have a very poor people flow. It was very congested. There was not enough seating, had really kind of antiquated heating and cooling. The roadways sort of landslide. They just got terribly clogged during busy periods. They just weren't up to the demand for. For air travel, modern air travel. And on the air side, the flights were just constantly delayed, mainly caused by the fact that the airport had single taxiways. So aircraft, they just couldn't push back from their gates as readily as they needed to because of congestion on the tarmac. If there's already a plane taxiing on that bit of bit of the airport, then they just couldn't push back, so they had to sit there when all of the passengers just sat there on the tarmac waiting to go, that can kind of compounded delays and gave it such a bad reputation.

[Caller]

Frequent flyers, we want to hear your takes on the new and improved LaGuardia Airport. What do you remember about the old days and what do you like better about the new hub? Or if you live nearby, call in and let us know how your neighborhood is impacted by being so close to one of the nation's busiest transportation hubs. Our Phone lines are open. 212-433-WNYC 212-433-9692. You can hit us up on our socials at Olive nyc. I'm talking with Joby Lubman. He is a writer and producer on Extreme Airport Engineering. Okay, there's a woman in the film and she's in a crowded terminal waiting area and she says, this is my first time in LaGuardia and it's probably my last because of really how Uncomfortable and frustrating the experience was. So from working on this film, what do we want our airports to provide instead of just being strictly utilitarian? What do they want? What do people want from their airports?

[Joby Lubman]

Well, I think, you know, traveling, I don't have to tell you, is an inherently tiring, stressful experience. Quite often you want to feel, you want to be in some level of comfort. You don't want to be sweating and crushed up against people and delayed. So efficiency really is at the heart of what a modern airport needs to do. People are contributors describing this, these airports as people processing facilities. Right. You want to get in and out of that place as quickly as possible. You're not going to the airport to hang out at the airport, are you? You're kind of. You're going in to get gone or you're, you know, so you want to be in and out there fast and anywhere, anything that's facilit that as pleasantly and as, you know, calmly as possible, that's what you want to do. And that's, I think, in part, that's really what they've tried to do with the new airport, minimise any pain associated with the airport experience.

[Alison Stewart]

LaGuardia has some unique challenges in geography. It comes right up against the Grand Central Parkway to the south and the east river and Flushing Bay hamming in from the north. Rick Cotton, the executive director of the Port of Authority, called it a ballet on a postage stamp. How do the geographic realities force designers to get creative with how they'd carry out the project?

[Joby Lubman]

That's right. Yeah. It's all of LaGuardia Airport would fit into Central park with 150 acres to spare. So this is really like a little spit of land out on the limb and was big enough back when they made it in the 30s, Mayor LaGuardia kind of had a conveyor belt across from Rikers island, and he conveyed tons and tons of debris and rocks across and put it into this huge metal mesh to create this sort of this land reclamation on the river. That metal mesh that kind of supports the whole airport, that still gives magnetic interference, causes problems with the planes. Believe it or not, they made it as big as they could. And as you say, it's covered is water on three sides, highway on the back. They needed to find a way to maximize the that space. And back, back in the 30s, it was, you know, they would have a linear design. Planes would just pull up opposite the terminal buildings. People would come out to the planes. Then they made this sort of finger design where they folded the edges of the concourses to allow more planes to park around the edges. But that created problems, especially after the 60s when planes got so much bigger, when more people wanted to travel, planes couldn't get inside those fingers and out of those fingers to the gates very easily. So one of the ways that they are improving things at LaGuardia now is with a satellite design so planes can park all the way around the edges. They have gates all the way around the edges of these satellites, concourses. And the important thing is that the aircraft have multiple ways to get to the Runway. And they've introduced, crucially, dual taxiways. So there's no longer this problem of having to wait for other aircraft to get out the way before they can push off from the gates. So it's kind of revolutionized the flow of aircraft at LaGuardia today. But getting there, of course, has been incredibly difficult. They had to rebuild the entire airport on top of the old airport, whilst keeping all of the flights running. And to do that, they. The secret, if you like, was to. Is in the phasing plan, what they would do with. They would. They would build new capacity, a new concourse, for example, and only then tear down the old capacity. So they were able to kind of leapfrog the old capacity by keeping the. The new capacity up and running. New gates coming all the time. Incredible. And they also moved everything back by 600ft towards the highway, which freed up 40 acres airside, which allowed them to make these dual taxiways and they built an extra concourse all the way out to the water's edge.

[Alison Stewart]

Let me ask you a question about that, though. With climate change, how, considering the future and what the future holds, how did they. How have they dealt with the idea that it could flood? I mean, they talked about Superstorm Sandy. How do they take climate change into existence given it's so surrounded by water?

[WNYC Studios]

Right.

[Joby Lubman]

Well, yeah, you have that example in 2012, right. Superstorm Sandy actually flooded LaGuardia Airport, which was really another reason why they had to completely revamp all of the drainage system and the pump houses. So the pump houses back then, they were. All the machinery was at knee level, so that got flooded and just backed up all the water and so it couldn't pump out the water that came over the storm wall. The new airport not only has a vast new drainage system with pump machinery that's higher up so it doesn't get so easily flooded, they also had to build the concourse that's right out on the bay, actually, on kind of stilts, up on pillars, columns. So the the bottom floor, the ground floor could not be, is just open, allowing flood water to flow through, so it shouldn't destroy that concourse. When flooding does happen, another crucial thing they had to do was obviously, this airport's right out on the river. There's only 10. The water table's just 10ft below the foundation. Any flooding is going to lift up those buildings and destroy them, crack all the concrete, make the new buildings completely uninhabitable. So what they had to do was they had to drill down, smash down these huge piles, these steel piles, fill them with concrete, reinforced, driven right down into the bedrock to sort of anchor the new airport buildings into the bedrock so that whenever that water table was rising and will rise in the future, those buildings aren't going to get lifted up in any way you imagine. It's like these, these buildings, they're basically like bathtubs kind of sunk into the reclaimed land. You put water up around those bathtubs, they're just going to float up. So they've had to anchor those with hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of these massive deep steel piles right down deep into the bedrock.

[Alison Stewart]

We are talking about the revamped, revitalized and thoroughly modern LaGuardia Airport in Queens with Joby Blubman, a writer and producer behind the new Nova special on PBS called Extreme Airport Engineering. We'll take your calls after the break. This is all of it.

[Joby Lubman]

Do you have a car, truck, boat, motorcycle or RV that is no longer of use to you, no matter what shape it's in? You can donate it to WNYC even if it's 100 years old, donating is easy. The pickup is free, and you'll get a tax deduction. Learn [e-mail] car some of President Trump's.

[Alison Stewart]

Executive orders seem to contravene established law, leading journalists to ask, is this legal?

[Joby Lubman]

Because the President is not a king. These are letters of intent, but they.

[Caller]

Don'T have any binding legal force.

[Joby Lubman]

And if we treat them as though they do, they're paralyzing.

[Alison Stewart]

On this week's on the Media from wnyc. Find on the Media. Wherever you get your podcasts.

[Caller]

You'Re listening.

[Alison Stewart]

To all of it on wnyc. I'm Alison Stewart. My guest is Joby Lubman. He's a writer and producer behind the new Nova special called Extreme Airport Engineering. Joby, let's take some calls. Let's talk to Mamish, who is calling from Garden City. Hi, Mimish.

[WNYC Studios]

Hi, Allison. It's Manish. I've listened to your show since the beginning. So pleasure speaking with you. I fly a lot for work, and I've traveled in and out of LaGuardia for years. It used to be a very miserable airport, and you only cared about your destination. During the construction, it was even worse. And I've actually watched the documentary with my. With my boys since they've flown out of LaGuardia as well. It's been really cool for them to see what's happened. But the airport is beautiful. The inside of it is amazing. It makes you want to actually hang out. All the restaurants, all the open space. Walking to your terminal, you can see the outside, you can see the bay. It's almost like a Zen garden kind of thing. And even driving past the airport at night on the Grand Central, it is a big, very beautiful airport. I realized it was 8 billion to cost, and you could see it was, well, money well spent. The one thing I would look forward to seeing is a public transportation linkage, the way JFK has one. But I think everything that they've done with the airport is beautiful.

[Alison Stewart]

Thanks so much, Maneesh. We really, really appreciate it. Let's talk to Sarah with a different opinion. Hi, Sarah.

[Sarah]

Hi. So I've been listening to Mr. Blumens talking about all the things they did. The ingenious design, the planes and the climate, and the previous callers talking about how much he enjoys hanging out at the airport. But for someone who just wants to get on a plane, the layout is horrendous. You go through security and you start to walk, and you walk and you walk and you walk past shops and you walk past restaurants, and it must be a minimum of 20 minutes and possibly half a mile or longer. And you're dragging your carry on suitcase, and you keep thinking because there's a sign that you're around the corner. It takes forever to get to the actual plane. And I, from what has been described previously, the satellites, the concourses, they were all done to make the planes have an easier time. But there was nothing done to help a passenger move quickly from when she or he goes through security to that actual plane.

[Alison Stewart]

Thank you, Sarah. Joby, do you have a response to that?

[Joby Lubman]

Yeah, that sounds like a lot of airports I know. And, yes, I'd say that's probably quite common for all major airports. And I think that speaks to the scale that these airports have to be now and the distances that are required to get people to their planes. I suppose, you know, I'd be interested to know if they. They. They had where Sarah was headed. The gate. Sarah was headed. If they had like those moving walkways, I know they install quite a lot of those, but obviously that sounds. Sounds like Sarah didn't have a lot of fun there.

[Alison Stewart]

Yeah. Let's talk to on the phone. We have Michael Seinfer. He was the director of photography and was on the ground at LaGuardia to oversee filming of the construction while it was underway. Michael, can you hear us?

[Joe Biden]

Yeah. Hello. Can you hear me?

[Alison Stewart]

I can hear you. I hear you. Great. So what kind of conversations did you have about visually telling the story of this massive project?

[Joe Biden]

I think one of the. I mean, we were just trying to get the scale of this and all the moving parts of everything that was trying to happen while running the airport at the same time. I mean, there's like these huge beats that had to happen at a certain, certain time. And I mean, just trying to get that in. In picture for this, for the documentary.

[Alison Stewart]

What were some of the logistical hurdles that you had shooting while this was all going on?

[Joe Biden]

Yeah, I mean, we were. We had to deal with the snowstorms and power and, you know, and. And then trying to make sure that we tell everything the way it's actually forming. So when we're. When they're cleaning out the runways, we had to get cameras on that at like four in the morning and follow the crews and, you know, and then being out with the iron workers who were amazing, and the super freezing cold. And there's just a lot of people that really cared about this and just being sure that we were there to make it happen.

[Caller]

Michael, thanks for the call. We're interested, Joby. I was interested in how many. There were a lot of moments when things could have gone wrong. Can you give us an example of when things really, really hinged on something being built? If it wasn't going to work out, the rest of the shoot wouldn't work out.

[Joby Lubman]

Well, you know, I mentioned earlier about this. Well, they were all kind of focused on this phasing plan, which is kind of like a. Almost like a, you know, kind of an IKEA kind of way to put it together. And it has what's called a critical path. So, for example, we filmed truss going up, which was going to form part of this, the oculus, this huge kind of grand entrance, part of the grand entrance to Terminal C. And they had to build this before the roadways could continue for the arrivals and departures roadways. So. And they had, you know, the way, you know, what weather's like in New York City. It's changing constantly. This storm coming in they had to change their plans to get this, the, this, these 80 ton trusses up to finish this part of the roof so that they could continue with the roadways. That's one example. If certain things aren't done, they can't move on to the next and that's going to cause delays for their, for their, for their schedule. And yeah, and then you had snowstorms like Michael said. That was crazy. I think that was the worst snowstorm you guys had for like five years back in the sort of winter of 2020. And yeah, it was. That could have caused them big problems that shut down the airport completely. I think there was hundreds of flights got canceled and of course the, there was some real danger of the snowplows hitting stuff because the airport was just changing day by day. The boundaries of the airport, the construction sites were changing day by day. Where the plow drivers thought the airport boundaries were might have changed, you know, so there was a danger I remember of them kind of hitting things and having to be incredibly careful while they were clearing snow.

[Alison Stewart]

This is interesting text. I was at LaGuardia the night of March 1992 when there was a terrible crash that left a plane in Flushing Bay. Especially after the horrible crash in D.C. last week. The positioning of airports right along the water which is common for the east coast makes me super nervous. I would love if the speaker could speak to this aspect of LaGuardia. Thanks.

[Joby Lubman]

Yeah. So for example, well, you, you guys will remember very clearly, I'm sure, the miracle on the Hudson when an aircraft taken off from LaGuardia got hit by a flock of birds and ended up ditching into the the Hudson. Luckily everyone was okay. I think that's an example of, you know, the flocks of seabirds in that case kind of interfering with, with aircraft. Now they've, they the new LaGuardia, from what they've we saw they take during the construction, there's a huge potential problem of garbage being kind of left around, you know, food for these 7,000 workers building the airport being left around and attracting birds. They had to be incredibly careful, incredibly conscious of attracting too many seabirds to the area. And they had to go around and be very and carefully remove any nests they found underneath the runways which jut out into the bay.

[Caller]

Was anything done to the airport to make it safer?

[Joby Lubman]

I'm not sure in terms of bird strikes or just in general in general. So for instance, they have, they're a great deal of the restrictions they have are around the sight lines for the air traffic control tower. They had to build these, the air traffic control tower. Sorry. They had to build the design the airport with these kind of inclined surfaces on the, the building. It's quite distinctive. If you, if you take a look, that's so that the air traffic control tower can see every gate, can see every movement any aircraft is making.

[Caller]

And also that's one of the things. Yeah. And I think they double the double runways for planes. They can see a lot clearer, see it all. We should watch Nova Extreme Airport engineering. Joby Lubman was my guest. Thank you so much for being with us.

[Joby Lubman]

Thanks, Alison. Take care.

[Caller]

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