Richard Vacar, who has been a proponent of an expensive renovation and expansion of Bush Intercontinental Airport despite significant planned capacity reduction by airlines, today is given a platform on the Chronicle news pages for his advocacy:
Hotels, parking lots, taxi companies and other businesses that rely on air travelers are expecting to see revenue fall as airlines cut capacity this fall. But Houston’s airports won’t share as much pain, according to the city’s top airport official.
Some airports across the country are scrapping plans for terminals and parking garages because of dropping revenue, but both Hobby and Bush Intercontinental airports will continue with current plans, including Bush’s $1.2 billion renovation and expansion of Terminal B, Houston Airport System chief Richard Vacar said.
“Really, compared to other airports, we’re doing quite well,” Vacar said. “I’m not trying to sugarcoat it.”
Bush will see a 5.2 percent decrease in flights in September compared with September 2007, or a loss of 265 per week, according to data from the airport system.
Since the story mentions that some airports have scrapped expansion plans, wouldn’t it have been an example of good journalism to cite some of the officials at those airports, and their rationale for not pursuing their expansion plans in a time of industry shrinkage? Or some independent expert, for that matter?
$1.2 billion is a significant amount of money. As commenter houtxcharles suggested here, a little more information wouldn’t hurt before we charge ahead. Instead, as usual when it comes to big public projects, we get cheerleading from the area’s newspaper of record.
