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Comparable Projects
Issues in Brief: The third runway is amazingly expensive, compared to other big runway projects. Normal heavy-duty runways cost something between $10,000 and $25,000 per running foot. The latest cost increase puts the third runway at more than $141,000 per foot.
When an airport has to buy new land for a new runway, costs go up, a serious disadvantage for tiny airports like Sea-Tac, LaGuardia, Logan, and the like, that are crammed into metropolitan centers. Here is a strong argument for building new airports, in locations where land is cheap.
A few major airports have been built on artificial islands in crowded East Asian cities, & their costs are enormous, even compared to the third runway. But in the U.S., the Sea-Tac third runway stands alone for expense. The new runway at Atlanta comes close, with a suspect, no-bid contract & a strange plan to MAKE fill by breaking-up country rock.
The elements that drive the "sticker price" for Sea-Tac so high are: the need to buy (condemn) expensive property; the cost of unprecedented amounts of fill; extraordinary engineering costs caused by the inappropriate hillside site; complex & expensive environmental engineering caused by the location that requires displacement of 20 acres of wetlands, stream relocation, and clean fill. Sea-Tac's third-runway project is unique – for excessive costs & ill-considered location.
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