Ricondo Lays Foundational Strategy for $14 Billion LAX Overhaul
New Concourse, Landside Access Modernization Program, and On-Call Services
Surrounded by the Pacific Ocean and a dense population of businesses and residences, it’s no secret that upgrading and expanding Los Angeles International Airport (LAX) is a bit like solving the Rubik’s Cube. So, in order to transform the world’s fifth-busiest airport into a futuristic transportation hub—with a new passenger concourse, automated people movers, a consolidated rental car facility, pedestrian bridges, parking lots, and connection to the Metro light rail system—it’s essential that every piece of the puzzle falls into place at the right time and place.
The Los Angeles World Airports (LAWA) team knew that solving a problem of this magnitude would require aviation’s top planning and problem solvers to get the project off the ground. That’s when LAWA hired Ricondo to lay the essential foundation with its strategic and technical expertise, stakeholder consensus-building, project planning, and environmental acumen.
A sampling of Ricondo’s work in bringing the $14 billion LAX vision to fruition includes:
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Midfield Satellite Concourse-North. A new midfield, multilevel concourse will add more than 20 domestic and international aircraft gates. Ricondo prepared a multiphased Midfield Satellite Concourse (MSC) program and project definition plan that includes demolishing and relocating existing infrastructure elements and building new conveyance systems, taxilanes, taxiways, aprons, utilities, and a supplemental Airport Traffic Control Tower. Ricondo also conducted an Initial Study and extensive Environmental Impact Report to satisfy air quality, greenhouse gas emissions, public service, and traffic concerns on both project and program levels.
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Landside Access Modernization Program Environmental Documentation. To fundamentally change how people access and move through the airport, LAWA is implementing an aggressive Landside Access Modernization Program (LAMP). This includes a brand-new automated people mover system, intermodal transportation facilities, a consolidated rental car facility, connections to Metro light rail, and reconfigured roadways and airport access points. However, to accomplish it all, LAWA needs to acquire new property, demolish existing buildings, and relocate and/or install new utilities. Ricondo led a multi-disciplinary team that engaged local stakeholders and coordinated among federal, state, and local agencies—in addition to managing numerous technical analyses, environmental surveys, entitlement documents, city and airport plan amendments, zone changes, and existing parcel reconfigurations to ensure compliance with the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) and the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA).
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On-Call Airport Planning Services. Through multiple professional planning service contracts, Ricondo works with senior LAWA staff as an owner representative to address terminal, airfield, landside, and environmental planning efforts. On-call assignments include passenger terminal programming and concept design, landside access simulation and analysis, runway and taxiway layout planning, airfield simulation modeling, financial feasibility studies, noise impact analyses, activity forecasts, and environmental planning services. Ricondo’s highly diversified expert teams, along with its 30 years of exclusive aviation-only consulting focus, make Ricondo the right partner to transform LAX into a revolutionized airport of the future.
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