JFK’s Bay Runway (31L), the second longest runway in the United States, is also a backup space shuttle landing spot. The primary runway for NASA at the Space Shuttle Facility is only 428 feet longer than the Bay Runway.
(Denver International Airport’s 16R/34L runway, measuring 16,000ft long, is the longest commercial runway in North America, and 6th longest in the world – China’s Qamdo Bamda Airport has the longest in the world at 18,045 ft)
JFK is operated by The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, under a lease with the City of New York since June 1, 1947. In 2004, the Port Authority and the City of New York concluded an agreement that ensures the Agency’s continued operation of JFK and LaGuardia airports through 2050.
JFK covers 4,930 acres, including 880 acres in the Central Terminal Area. The airport has more than 30 miles of roads.
About $150 million was expended on original construction. The Port Authority has invested about $7 billion in the airport, not including the recently (2016) approved capital plan.
About 37,000 people are employed at JFK. The airport contributes about $37.3 billion in economic activity to the New York metropolitan region, generating about 256,000 total jobs and $13.4 billion in annual wages and salaries.
JFK has six operating airline terminals, surrounded by a dual ring of peripheral taxiways. The six terminals, containing 128 gates, are numbered 1–8 but skipping terminals 3 (demolished in 2013) and 6 (demolished in 2011).
The light-rail service AirTrain connects JFK with the Long Island Rail Road (LIRR) and New York City subway and bus lines. At the airport, AirTrain provides fast, free connections between terminals, rental car facilities, hotel shuttle areas, and parking lots. In 2012, 5.7 million passengers used AirTrain JFK. Through the end of 2014, more than 53.2 million paid riders have used the airport rail system, along with tens of millions more riders who’ve used it to connect between JFK’s passenger terminals, long-term parking, and the rental car areas. Recent improvements include digital signage; expanded closed-circuit televisions; track, switch, and third-rail heaters to improve reliability in cold weather; and a digital audio recording system for monitoring critical communications in real time.
AirTrain JFK opened on December 17, 2003. It wasn’t a random date. It also happened to be the 100th anniversary of the Wright Brothers’ first flight at Kitty Hawk, N.C.
JFK’s 321-foot tower, which opened in 1994, includes state-of-the-art communications, radar and wind-shear alert systems. At the time of its completion, the JFK tower was the world’s tallest control tower. It was subsequently displaced from that position by towers at other airports in both the United States and overseas, including those at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport, currently the tallest tower at any U.S. airport, at 398 feet and at Suvarnabhumi International Airport in Bangkok, Thailand, currently the world’s tallest control tower at 434 feet.
The airport offers customers over 15,000 parking-spaces in a variety of places, including: multi-level parking garages, surface spaces in the Central Terminal Area, a long-term parking and a cell phone lot. A reservation system was introduced in 2011.
JFK is one of the world’s leading international air cargo centers. The airport offers nearly 4 million sq ft of modern, state-of-the-art cargo warehouse and office space. The entire air cargo area is designated as a Foreign-Trade-Zone. JFK serves the world’s key air cargo markets though a strong mix of long-haul, direct and nonstop all-cargo aircraft and wide-body passenger aircraft flights. When ranked by the value of shipments passing through it, JFK is the number three freight gateway in the United States (after the Port of Los Angeles and the Port of New York and New Jersey), and the number one international air freight gateway in the United States. Almost 21% of all U.S. international air freight by value and 9.6% by tonnage moved through JFK in 2008.
Total runway length is nine miles. Taxiways total 25 miles in length. All runways have high-intensity runway edge lighting, centerline and taxiway exit lighting and are grooved to improve skid resistance and minimize hydroplaning. A 500-foot by 150-foot aircraft arrestor bed has been installed at the end of Runway 4R, the first such arrestor bed in the world. In addition, the Bay Runway reconstruction project expanded 13R-31L from 150 to 200 feet wide in 2011.
A Peruvian International Airways’ DC-4 arriving from Santiago, Chile, was the first regularly scheduled airliner to arrive at the airport, touching down on July 9, 1948.
Over 90 airlines operate out of the airport, with non-stop or direct flights to destinations in all six inhabited continents. It serves as a hub for American Airlines and Delta Air Lines and is the primary operating base for JetBlue Airways. In the past, JFK served as a hub for Eastern, National, Pan Am, and TWA.
JFK opened with six runways and a seventh under construction; runways 1L and 7L were held in reserve and never came into use as runways. Runway 31R (originally 8,000 ft) is still in use; runway 31L (originally 9,500 ft) opened soon after the rest of the airport and is still in use; runway 1R closed in 1957 and runway 7R closed around 1966. Runway 4 (originally 8,000 ft, now runway 4L) opened June 1949 and runway 4R was added ten years later.
The airport was designed for aircraft up to 300,000-pound gross weight and had to be modified in the late 1960s to accommodate Boeing 747s.
On August 1, 2008, JFK received the first regularly scheduled commercial A380 flight to the United States, on Emirates’ New York–Dubai route using Terminal 4. Other airlines that operate the A380 to JFK include Singapore Airlines on the New York–Frankfurt – Singapore route, Air France on the New York – Paris route, Lufthansa on the New York – Frankfurt route, Korean Air and Asiana Airlines on the New York – Seoul route and Etihad on the New York – Abu Dhabi route. On December 8, 2015, JFK also became the first U.S. airport to receive a commercial Airbus A350 flight when Qatar Airways began operating the aircraft on its New York – Doha route.
