Houston Airports director details hurricane recovery, new gates and passenger improvements

Houston Airport System Director Jim Czesniak told the City of Houston's Economic Development Committee on July 17 that airport operations recovered rapidly after the recent hurricane and that several large redevelopment projects are advancing to expand capacity and improve passenger experience.

Czesniak said Hobby Airport resumed operations about four hours after the storm's eyewall passed and that both Hobby and George Bush Intercontinental Airport (IAH) reached full operations within two days. "Within four hours of the hurricane passing, we were arriving flights," he said, praising airport staff for their emergency response.

The director highlighted system-scale figures to justify the construction work: Houston serves 193 nonstop destinations, handled about 16.1 million passengers last year and supports roughly 190,000 jobs and $36.4 billion in annual economic activity. Czesniak emphasized the airport system is an enterprise fund that does not draw from the city general fund.

Czesniak described ongoing redevelopment under ITRIP, including a D West Pier with six international-capable gates and a new central processing/ticketing hall intended to return Terminal E operations to United and relieve congestion in Terminal C. He said the new infrastructure will include an expanded security-processing footprint that will ultimately feature about 17 security checkpoints and that long-span steel leaf trusses are being assembled on site to cover the new departures deck.

On customer experience, the airport uses a "passenger journey score" combining 12 data sources (restrooms, roadway traffic, Wi-Fi, TSA and CBP wait times, elevators/escalators, water pressure, parking status) and runs quarterly passenger surveys and an annual SkyTrax audit. Czesniak said the airport meets its TSA wait-time goal (22 minutes or less) roughly 90% of the time at IAH and more than 90% at Hobby; CBP waits are meeting the target of under 30 minutes at Hobby and are close at IAH.

To handle peak summer volume and special events, the airport has added overtime for police and landside staff, funded additional CBP officer overtime and shifted to an active curb-loading model to reduce roadway dwell time. Parking capacity has been increased with about 600 new spaces in a recently opened garage and roughly 125 additional spaces to open soon as required egress work (fire towers) is completed. Czesniak said the airport is also consolidating employee parking to free terminal-core spaces.

Czesniak previewed airline investments: United is undertaking a $2.55 billion Terminal B replacement at Hobby, and Southwest is advancing a $470 million, seven-gate expansion at Hobby (six gates for Southwest and one "city gate" intended to attract additional carriers). The airport is also investing an estimated $30 million in restroom upgrades across terminals, adding ADA improvements, adult changing rooms and smart fixtures.

Councilmembers pressed Czesniak on resilience and operational details. He acknowledged cargo-area outages during the storm were primarily power-related and that the airport will follow up with the utility (CenterPoint) to reduce future risk. On restroom design, one councilmember suggested simple family-friendly features such as step stools and continued provision of free feminine hygiene products; Czesniak invited staff to meet offline on design details.

The director said many construction milestones are on track, with phased openings expected: United operations in the new processing area in early 2025 and foreign-flag carriers moving in by late summer 2025 once baggage systems are completed. He also noted the airport had recorded 5,000,000 man-hours on the project without a lost-time injury, a metric he cited to underscore construction safety.

The committee thanked Czesniak and staff for the presentation and the meeting proceeded to the next agenda item.