Panethos<p><strong>America’s smallest MAJOR airports by acreage – 2025 REWRITE</strong></p> <a href="https://panethos.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/smarttravelcom.jpg" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"></a>Orange County (John Wayne) Airport – Source: smarttravel.com <p>The following is a list of the 40 smallest major airports in the USA (including territories) ranked by their total land area. A minimum of 1,000,000 passengers (enplanements + deplanements) and 1,500 acres or less was the criteria used in this list. As can be seen, some very busy and important airports are identified in the list. Passenger data is from calendar year 2024.</p><p>Seven of the airports listed are in California, six of which are in the southern part of the state (Orange County, Burbank, San Diego, Palm Springs, Long Beach, and Santa Barbara) and San Jose in the north. Six airports are from New York. Three are downstate (La Guardia, White Plains, and Islip) and three are upstate (Albany, Greater Rochester, and Buffalo).</p> <a href="https://panethos.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/torreypinestowncarcom.jpg" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"></a>San Diego (Lindbergh) Airport – Source: torreypinestowncar.com <p>As is evident from the aerial photos included with the post, most of these airports have been surrounded by development, which limits their long-term growth potential and ability to adapt to new aircraft. It also can lead to friction between the airport authority and neighbors due to aircraft noise, traffic, and hours of operation. This can lead to costly litigation, noise abatement, or land acquisition.</p> <a href="https://panethos.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/therealdealcom.jpg" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"></a>New York (La Guardia) Airport – Source the realdeal.com <a href="https://panethos.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/sj.jpg" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"></a>San Jose (Mineta) Airport – Source: flickr.com <p>While not every city has massive amounts of land available to construct a new airport (i.e. Denver or Dallas-Fort Worth), early and proactive regional planning efforts to properly channel and regulate development surrounding the airport in a manner which allows for increased aviation traffic is paramount to the long-term viability of the facility. Granted, in most of the cases listed in this post, hindsight is 20/20. Environmental, aviation, and land use restrictions can and will negatively the potential for future passenger and cargo growth. In some cases this limits the facility to serve only domestic flights, limited-distance flights, or in multiple airport metropolitan regions as a reliever or secondary airport.</p><p>Many thanks to Gary for providing the updated 2024 data and list for this post. His help is greatly appreciated.</p><p>Peace!</p><p><strong>*FYI:</strong> If two airports cover the same amounts of acreage, the number of passengers was used to determine the order in which they are listed.</p><p>_______</p><ol><li>Charlotte Amalie (Cyril E. King)-St. Thomas, U.S. Virgin Islands: 280 acres = 1,626,000 passengers</li><li>Key West, Florida: 334 acres = 1,449,649 passengers</li><li>McAllen, Texas: 370 acres = 1,206,320 passengers</li><li>Orange County (John Wayne), California: 504 acres = 11,089,405 passengers </li><li>Jackson Hole, Wyoming: 533 acres = 1,055,176 passengers</li><li>Burbank (Bob Hope), California: 555 acres = 6,550,281 passengers – see featured photo at the top of the article</li><li>Chicago (Midway), Illinois: 650 acres = 21,513,521 passengers</li><li>San Diego (Lindbergh), California: 663 acres = 25,242,377 passengers</li><li>New York City (La Guardia), New York: 680 acres = 33,543,943 passengers</li><li>Harrisburg, Pennsylvania: 680 acres = 1,444,778 passengers</li><li>White Plains (Westchester County), New York: 702 acres = 2,308,000 passengers</li><li>Portland (Jetport), Maine: 726 acres = 2,438,054 passengers</li><li>Washington (Reagan National), DC: 861 acres = 26,290,722 passengers</li><li>Asheville, North Carolina: 900 acres = 2,174,125 passengers </li><li>Lexington (Blue Grass), Kentucky: 911 acres = 1,571,805 passengers</li><li>Lihue, Hawaii: 915 acres = 3,671,963 passengers</li><li>Medford (Rogue Valley), Oregon: 938 acres = 1,032,704 passengers</li><li>Palm Springs, California: 940 acres = 3,230,914 passengers</li><li>Burlington, Vermont: 942 acres = 1,336,000 passengers</li><li>Santa Barbara, California: 948 acres = 1,418,996 passengers</li><li>Chattanooga, Tennessee: 950 acres = 1,108,602 passengers</li><li>Buffalo-Niagara Falls, New York: 1,000 acres = 4,961,000 passengers</li><li>Albany, New York: 1,000 acres = 2,973,000 passengers</li><li>Hilo, Hawaii: 1,007 acres = 1,427,465 passengers</li><li>San Jose (Mineta), California: 1,050 acres = 11,851,270 passengers</li><li>Sarasota-Bradenton, Florida: 1,102 acres = 4,245,686 passengers</li><li>Providence (T.F. Green), Rhode Island: 1,111 acres = 4,011,681 passengers</li><li>Greater Rochester, New York: 1,136 acres = 2,652,000 passengers</li><li>Long Beach, California: 1,166 acres = 4,148,080 passengers</li><li>Louisville (Muhammad Ali), Kentucky: 1,200 acres = 4,816,084 passengers</li><li>Pensacola, Florida: 1,211 acres = 3,056,000 passengers</li><li>Dallas (Love Field), Texas: 1,300 acres = 16,331,347 passengers</li><li>Norfolk, Virginia: 1,300 acres = 4,864,752 passengers</li><li>Houston (Hobby), Texas: 1,304 acres = 14,612,605 passengers</li><li>Islip (Long Island MacArthur), New York: 1,311 acres = 1,361, 000 passengers</li><li>Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood, Florida: 1,380 acres = 35,208,611 passengers</li><li>Kahului, Hawaii: 1,391 acres = 7,087,116 passengers</li><li>Reno-Tahoe, Nevada: 1,450 acres = 4,849,976 passengers</li><li>New Orleans (Louis Armstrong), Louisiana: 1,500 acres = 13,201,419 passengers</li><li>Manchester-Boston, New Hampshire: 1,500 acres = 1,272,689 passengers</li></ol> <a href="https://panethos.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/flickrcom.jpg" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"></a>Chicago (Midway) Airport – Source: flickr.com <p><strong>Sources:</strong></p><ul><li>en.wikipedia.org</li><li><a href="http://www.sitelevel.com/query=acres&B1=Search&crid=71805b845d4090d6" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">http://www.sitelevel.com/query=acres&B1=Search&crid=71805b845d4090d6</a></li><li><a href="http://www.san.org/Education/History" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">http://www.san.org/Education/History</a></li><li>Updated 2024 data provided via emails from Gary, whose sources included en.wikipedia.org; individual airport websites; FAA Airport Form 5010; SkyVector airport data; and the Bureau of Transportation Statistics (BTS TranStats).</li></ul><p><a rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" class="hashtag u-tag u-category" href="https://panethos.wordpress.com/tag/air-travel/" target="_blank">#airTravel</a> <a rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" class="hashtag u-tag u-category" href="https://panethos.wordpress.com/tag/airport-planning/" target="_blank">#airportPlanning</a> <a rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" class="hashtag u-tag u-category" href="https://panethos.wordpress.com/tag/airports/" target="_blank">#airports</a> <a rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" class="hashtag u-tag u-category" href="https://panethos.wordpress.com/tag/aviation/" target="_blank">#aviation</a> <a rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" class="hashtag u-tag u-category" href="https://panethos.wordpress.com/tag/cities/" target="_blank">#cities</a> <a rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" class="hashtag u-tag u-category" href="https://panethos.wordpress.com/tag/geography/" target="_blank">#geography</a> <a rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" class="hashtag u-tag u-category" href="https://panethos.wordpress.com/tag/history/" target="_blank">#history</a> <a rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" class="hashtag u-tag u-category" href="https://panethos.wordpress.com/tag/infrastructure/" target="_blank">#infrastructure</a> <a rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" class="hashtag u-tag u-category" href="https://panethos.wordpress.com/tag/land-use/" target="_blank">#landUse</a> <a rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" class="hashtag u-tag u-category" href="https://panethos.wordpress.com/tag/planning/" target="_blank">#planning</a> <a rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" class="hashtag u-tag u-category" href="https://panethos.wordpress.com/tag/tourism/" target="_blank">#tourism</a> <a rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" class="hashtag u-tag u-category" href="https://panethos.wordpress.com/tag/transportation/" target="_blank">#transportation</a> <a rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" class="hashtag u-tag u-category" href="https://panethos.wordpress.com/tag/travel/" target="_blank">#travel</a></p>