Early airfields and airports grew from the use of airplanes for military, agricultural, airmail, and even aerial observation purposes. Equipped with grass or dirt runways, they were not very pleasant places for those passengers that first flew once US scheduled airline service began in 1926. Arriving and departing aircraft blasted dirt, pebbles, and grit into the passengers' faces as they walked exposed through all types of weather and climbed open stairways onto their planes. Eventually, procedures changed so that aircraft could warm up away from the passengers, then be pushed to the boarding area by hand with the engine off, boarded, and restarted with the doors closed. Many of these airfields originated as a result of the airmail system created in the United States just after World War I. As postal officials laid plans for a transcontinental airmail system between New York and San Francisco via Chicago in 1921, they persuaded many local communities to build the necessary facilities for the service in what became a “triumphal procession” across the country. Many of our largest airports can trace their beginnings back to those early days and this is the first installment in a series which will trace the growth and development of what are today some of the largest airports in the nation. First up: Houston Intercontinental Airport.
Known today as the George Bush Intercontinental Airport, Houston is one of the busiest in the US, ranked twelfth in 2021 with over thirty-three million passengers. But the skies over the city were not always so busy. Back in 1910, only seven years after the Wright Brothers first flight at Kill Devil Hills, NC, a Frenchman named Louis Paulhan also made aviation history. Paulhan was a jovial aviator who took the world by storm. He was one of the first ten licensed pilots in France and one of only a handful around the globe. In a short time, he became one of the best in the world. In January 1910, he broke his own record by flying at an altitude of more than 4,000 feet at a California air show. Later that year, he would complete the longest flight at the time: more than four hours in the air. Huge crowds came to see him flying an airplane, the new technological wonder, and he brought his air show to Texas. On February 18, 1910, he flew the first airplane in Houston. It was a Henri Farman Biplane and about 2,500 people paid $1 to see him take to the skies. And he had only learned to fly a plane the year before!
Most of the early advances in Texas aviation would come from the military. The army quickly became interested in airplanes and depended upon the Wright brothers for pilot training and purchasing airplanes.The city’s first commercial airport arrived on the scene in 1927. A small private airfield, known as Carter Field, opened in that year to serve regional airlines, including Eastern Air Lines and Braniff. It was acquired by the city of Houston in 1937 with a bond issue of $500,000 and $150,000 in cash ($10.3 and $3 million today) and Carter Field became known as Houston Municipal, the city’s first public airport.
Long before his days as the world’s most famous recluse, Howard Hughes flew planes fast and far. In 1938, the American manufacturer, aviator, motion-picture producer and director who acquired enormous wealth and celebrity from his various ventures, set a new speed record for flying around the world in three days, nineteen hours and seventeen minutes in a Lockheed Model 14 Super Electra. Returning home to Houston, Hughes received a hero's welcome. The aviator was honored with a downtown parade and a banquet at the Rice Hotel. The city soon honored him by renaming the Houston Municipal Airport the Howard Hughes Municipal Airport. The renowned aviator remained involved with the airport by financing several noted improvements, including the construction of the airport’s first control tower. Unfortunately for him, the new name was short lived as the city later learned they would lose federal grant funds for naming an airport after a living person and so it took back its former name.
Service at the airport expanded rapidly and significantly after the Second World War, with Braniff launching several international connections beginning in 1948 and Pan Am in 1950. Four years later, it became Houston Intercontinental Airport and its current name of William P Hobby Airport followed in 1967. Despite expansions, including a major new terminal, the airport became overcrowded as the jet age took hold. Plans for a new airport began to take shape in the early 1960s. The Civil Aeronautics Board (predecessor to the Federal Aviation Administration) recommended a new airport, and a group of local business leaders purchased land for this as early as 1957. The land was sold to the city in 1961, but more acreage was needed and this delayed the start of airport construction until 1965. There were further delays with increasing costs, design changes to the original terminals, and construction problems, including tunneling difficulties. The new airport finally opened in 1969. Initially all traffic transferred over from Hobby Airport, but that airport was later given a new lease on life when Southwest Airlines moved their Houston operations there in 1971.
The intercontinental airport expanded quickly. A new Terminal C was added to the facility’s original two terminals in 1981. A dedicated International Terminal D followed in 1990. The airport was renamed the George Bush Intercontinental Airport in 1997 in honor of the 41st US President. The airport now covers 10,000 acres and has ten runways which, if placed end-to-end, would be forty-three miles long. It has one hundred thirty gates in five terminals that are connected by skyway and subway train services.
But, the airport's now more than a half-century old and will be getting a much-needed makeover soon. City officials, and US Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, came together in mid-September to celebrate the announcement of a $40 million Federal grant to modernize the aging airport. Specifically, the funds will go toward renovating Terminal A and adding new gates, changes that will also require upgrades to security checkpoints and baggage claim areas. Plans also include improvements to the terminal's energy efficiency and ticketing, as well as the modernizing of curbside access and loading bridges. The renovation project will begin with Terminal A's four-gate north expansion, though phasing is still being finalized, explained Augusto Bernal, spokesperson for the Houston Airport System (HAS). "The federal funding is part of the overall infrastructure projects meant to improve the reliability of facilities for the continued growth of service," Bernal reported. "Houston is a growing market for air connectivity and these grants are an integral part of the overall infrastructure improvements needed to accommodate more demand."
Of course, any story about the Houston Airport would not be complete without reference to its status as a hub city. Most of the busiest airports in the US owe their standing at least partly to airline hub traffic. Houston is no exception. The airport was home base for Continental Airlines beginning in 1983. Since their merger with United Airlines in 2010, Houston has remained one of United’s eight US hubs, with the others being Chicago, Denver, Guam, Los Angeles, Newark, San Francisco and Washington Dulles. Houston is United’s largest hub when measured by available seats, and the carrier took 72 per cent of the airport’s total seat capacity in 2021.
With scheduled flights to a large number of domestic and international destinations covering five continents, Houston Intercontinental has come a long way since the early days of air service to the city. Twenty-seven passengers airlines now fly from there to one hundred eighty-seven non-stop destinations. It’s the busiest airport in Texas for international passenger traffic and number of international destinations served, as well as being the twelfth busiest airport in the country in terms of total passenger traffic, accommodating over forty-five million travelers in 2019.
Until next time…safe travels.
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