Trump to announce $22B makeover of Dulles airport

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump is expected Wednesday to announce a $22 billion renovation of Washington Dulles International Airport that will end the use of the widely disliked “people movers,” the mobile lounges that have been used for decades to shuttle travelers to and from the main terminal.

The airport makeover would expand a long list of renovation projects the Republican president is pursuing to leave a lasting mark on the Washington region after his term ends in January 2029. Among other undertakings, he has plans to build a new White House ballroom along with a towering triumphal arch near the Lincoln Memorial.

In place of the people movers, the airport will add a new passenger train and more moving walkways, and the parking lot will be moved closer to the main terminal, according to a White House official who shared details of the Republican president’s plan under condition of anonymity before an announcement.

Trump will announce his plans at an Oval Office event Wednesday afternoon alongside Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy.

Dulles, located in northern Virginia, is about 25 miles (40 kilometers) from downtown Washington and run by the Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority, which also operates Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport. The project will be financed by the airports authority and the airlines serving Dulles, the White House official said.

Dulles is one of three airports that serve the Washington region. Dulles is the primary international airport serving the region although Baltimore Washington International Airport, which is farther away than Dulles, also offers overseas flights. Reagan National is the most convenient of the three airports, which makes it popular with members of Congress and local residents, but it primarily handles domestic flights.

Trump said in December that Dulles needs to be redesigned because “it’s not a good airport.”

The president, a former real estate developer, said back then that the Dulles building was “incorrectly designed.” He nonetheless praised Eero Saarinen, the Finnish-American architect and designer of the airport’s main terminal.

“We’re going to turn that around and we’re going to make Dulles airport — serving Washington and Virginia, Maryland, etc. — we’re gonna make that into something really spectacular,” Trump said at the Cabinet meeting in December. “We have an amazing plan for it.”

Dulles has relied on people movers since it opened in 1962.

Designed by Chrysler Corp., the vehicles shuttle passengers between the terminal and aircraft. The airport operates a fleet of 19 mobile lounges, each capable of carrying up to 102 passengers, according to its website.

When Dulles debuted, the airport touted the system as a major convenience. Passengers, it said, “had to walk only 200 feet once they entered the terminal until they were seated in a mobile lounge for the short trip directly to their aircraft,” a service it described as unique to Dulles.

But they have become one of passengers’ least favorite aspects of transiting through Dulles.

One of the mobile lounges crashed in November, sending 18 people to the hospital.

Dulles began a multibillion-dollar construction program in 2000 to begin to address future passenger demand. Major projects included two new parking garages, a fourth runway, a new concourse, a new Air Traffic Control tower, pedestrian walks and an airport train system, according to the airports authority website.

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Associated Press writers Rio Yamat in Las Vegas and Josh Funk in Omaha, Neb., contributed to this report.