Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport hit another milestone in one of its biggest improvement projects: the widening of Concourse D.
The second phase of a massive $1.4 billion project to expand the concourse started overnight Tuesday, when a prefabricated module was slowly moved from a construction site into place alongside the existing concourse structure by Wednesday morning.
Concourse D is the narrowest and most cramped of the seven concourses at the world’s busiest airport.
Credit: Source: Hartsfield-Jackson
Credit: Source: Hartsfield-Jackson
The idea has been to expand the concourse and allow for larger planes, while minimizing disruption to gate usage in the process. As many as eight gates at a time have closed for the construction, while the rest of the concourse remains in use.
Four more modules will be moved into place by the end of January, and attached to the concourse to widen and lengthen it.
Phase 1, with the first five modules, was completed with the building pieces moved and attached to one side of the concourse last year. The first expanded gates opened last September.
Credit: Source: Hartsfield-Jackson
Credit: Source: Hartsfield-Jackson
Ultimately, by summer 2029 there will be 19 modules added to the concourse, making it grow from 60 feet wide to 99 feet wide. It will also have higher ceilings, larger gate areas and more spacious restrooms.
The Concourse D widening project has been underway since 2022.
The project received $40 million in federal funding from the federal bipartisan infrastructure law.
The project will nearly double the size of Concourse D’s floor space from about 125,000 square feet to 225,000 square feet. But the number of gates on D will actually decrease from 40 to 34, because the gates will be designed to handle larger aircraft.
Credit: Source: Hartsfield-Jackson
Credit: Source: Hartsfield-Jackson
Editor’s note: Portions of this article first appeared in the AJC’s new Atlanta air travel newsletter, The Concourse, which you can subscribe to via The Concourse on The Atlanta Journal-Constitution’s page on LinkedIn.
Credit: Natrice Miller / Natrice.Miller@ajc.com
