Travelers seeking cheap airplane tickets , cheap vacation packages, or last minute deals may have to pay more to fly if traveling through New Yorks John F. Kennedy International Airport during the duration of JFKs main runway being closed for four months, starting March 1st. This project is costing $376 million.
The runway is being repaved with concrete vs. less durable asphalt, widened to handle larger planes, and taxiways added to reduce traffic congestion.
Travelers flying out of JFK can expect higher ticket prices since the airlines have reduced their schedules while the main runway is out of service. Daily arrivals and departures are projected to decrease to 1,050 from an average of 1,300. Airlines will be able to increase prices because there will be fewer available seats to satisfy demand.
Millions of airline passengers will experience delays as a result of this closure, though many may not be flying on the East coast.
Given that approximately one third of JFKs traffic and half of its departures will be moved to JFKs three smaller runways, planes will sit in longer lines on the ground waiting to takeoff and in the air waiting to land. These delays are expected to impact airports across the U.S.
The most traveled domestic destinations from JFK (based on number of passengers) are Los Angeles, San Francisco, Orlando, Las Vegas, and San Juan, Puerto Rico. The most popular international destinations from JFK are London, Paris, Frankfurt, Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, and Rome.
JFK suffers from one of the worst on-time records among major airports, ranking 28th out of 31 airports. The FAA (Federal Aviation Administration) is projecting delays at JFK to be about 50 minutes during peak times and 29 minutes on average.
48 million people travel through JFK, making it the 13th busiest airport in the world for passenger traffic.