"Minneapolis airport takes hard look at parking, security ; Passengers' convenience may become secondary"

September 23, 2001

Airport takes hard look at parking, security ; Passengers' convenience
may become secondary
The Minneapolis (MN) Star-Tribune


In the days after the Persian Gulf War began in January 1991, officials
hurriedly placed concrete barricades in front of the main doors at the
Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport out of fear that terrorists
might hide a bomb inside a parked car.

But the Gulf War came and went, as did the barricades. A year later,
with security concerns eased, the airport busily expanded the valet
parking garage directly under the terminal - where 360 cars already
parked - by adding 120 more spaces.

Throughout the 1990s, as attacks by terrorists sprang up, the response
in Minneapolis-St. Paul and at other major airports nationwide has ebbed
and flowed. Up until the day of the terrorist attacks in New York City
and Washington, decisions on where to park cars at the airport have been
largely driven by passenger convenience.

"The old adage [is] the closer you can get to the front door, the better
off you are," said Hugh Schilling, a former Metropolitan Airports
Commission chairman. "No one likes to walk." 

The issue again is at the forefront as a major percentage of MSP's
parking has been closed by federal authorities because of its proximity
to the main terminal. And airport officials are being forced to consider
whether fundamental changes, as opposed to temporary solutions, need to
be made for security.

"Nobody could have estimated the magnitude of this event," said Bonnie
Wilson of Airports Council International, a Washington, D.C.- based
trade group that represents the owners and operators of major airports
in Canada and the United States. Most airports, she said, have long
built parking ramps close to terminals because "it is important that we
do not make it too difficult to get from Point A to Point B." 

Patrick Hogan, a spokesman for the Metropolitan Airports Commission,
said officials at MSP are wrestling with a series of issues related to
security stemming from the Sept. 11 attacks. He said airport officials
are studying whether to add more fences and gates around the airport's
perimeter to prevent unauthorized vehicles from entering.

Hogan also said officials are debating whether to move security and
metal detector checkpoints back beyond the shopping and restaurant area,
though he said the security advantages of doing so are not clear. He
said that because there may be security advantages to leaving the
checkpoints where they are, they may not be moved unless the airport is
required to do so.

Moving the checkpoints farther back, he added, might lead to even more
confusion and delays because many connecting passengers would be forced
to go through them as they switched concourses.

Window protection

The more pressing issue, he said, is how to cope with a federal
guideline reinstituted in the wake of the World Trade Center attack that
requires cars not be parked closer than 300 feet of the terminal. The
airport's Green and Gold parking ramps, which are now closed and total
7,800 spaces, are within the 300-foot radius.

Only last month, workers completed a $281,000 project in which the
windows of the main terminal were coated with a special film to keep
them from spraying glass shards in the event of a bomb blast. The
project, officials said, was an attempt to address the fact that two of
the airport's parking ramps are closer than permitted by federal
guidelines. Parking fees are the MAC's biggest source of income.

The window coating was driven in part by what happened in the fall of
1995, during a previous terrorist alert. At that time, the United States
was on a heightened alert because of Pope John Paul's visit to the
country, the 50th anniversary of the United Nations and the
tension-filled trial of several militant terrorists in New York City.

Federal authorities, fearful of car bombs at major airports, had moved
to restrict parking within 300 feet of any terminal. In response,
officials at MSP tightened security by inspecting vehicles arriving at
the airport, especially large trucks.

Three months later, on the eve of the busy Thanksgiving traveling
weekend, the restrictions were eased as authorities felt confident that
the threat had passed.

In a sign of how airport planning was continuing before Sept. 11,
workers broke ground in July for a 10,000- to 12,000-vehicle parking
ramp that would be within 300 feet of the airport's Humphrey Terminal.
That project is now being reexamined.

"We may have to rethink things at airports across the country," said
Gordy Longton, commander of the airport's security division. "[But]
there's a ton of tradeoffs." 

New airport no panacea

Six years ago, the state decided to abandon the idea of building a new
airport in a largely rural area south of the Twin Cities and instead
embark on a major remodeling of the existing airport. Although the issue
still draws controversy, Metropolitan Council Chairman Ted Mondale said
a new airport would still have led to parking garages being built close
to the terminal. Just because a new airport in Dakota County would have
occupied more land, said Mondale, does not mean that the parking ramps
would have been built farther away.

"I don't think anything [from] the bombing would have anybody go back
and revisit the question" of whether a new airport should have been
built, said Mondale, who, as a state senator, led the move to keep the
existing airport.

Indeed, many airports, including those that have recently been built or
remodeled, have chosen to build large parking ramps near the terminal.
"Obviously, this is going to be a more compact, urban airport than one
that is going to be built down in Hastings," he said.

"[But] if you say these type of airports aren't safe, you're talking
about knocking down [New York City's] La Guardia and [Washington's]
National . . . what are you going to do?" he said.

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