O'Hare Is Getting An $8.5 BILLION Facelift But The Designs Submitted Are GARBAGE
(Curbed)–After months of speculation and mounting anticipation, the high-stakes international design competition to reimagine Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport released five architectural concepts for the ambitious $8.5 billion project.
The five teams, whittled down from a field of 12 that answered the city’s request for qualifications, include some of the planet’s top architectural talents. Their task: design a 21st-century global terminal to replace the airport’s aging 1960s-era Terminal 2.
Slated for completion in 2028, the massive facility will handle both domestic and international flights and include its own customs and immigration checkpoints. Combined with two new satellite terminals, the overhaul will increase O’Hare’s total terminal area by an estimated 60 percent, from 5.5 to 8.9 million square feet.
Here we go again with another MASSIVE expense the city doesn’t need and a construction project that won’t be done until 2028 that’ll only make the next 10 years of going to ORD worse than it already is. And make no mistake about it. O’Hare sucks. It’s ENORMOUS and busy but feels small. I don’t get easily overwhelmed, but going to O’Hare stresses me out. These designs all look pretty sweet if I am being totally honest, but I don’t need any of those amenities.
I don’t care about the way the building looks from the outside, or natural light, or wood finished kiosks. Fuck that. There are only three things you need in an airport to make it an enjoyable experience.
1) More places to eat
O’Hare SUCKS at food options. If you’re delayed in Terminal 1 then prepare to fast. If you do get a seat at that Berghoff Cafe well…a) I hate you because that place is always slammed and b) if you order schnitzel and sour kraut before getting on a plane then you should be treated as a flight risk even if it is technically entrapment because there are no other food3 options at that end of terminal one. I don’t need anymore “fresh market expresses” either. There’s nothing sadder than looking over your options and deciding to go with the pre-packaged turkey and cheese in saran wrap because that is literally the best thing you can get.
I am a simple man. Just put a chipotle, a panera, and a portillos in there. Things that are quick that I know I can trust to be edible. I don’t think that is too much to ask.
2) More and Better Places To Sit
Musical chairs at your gate while waiting for your stupid flight to some stupid butthole city is the worst. You finally get a spot and you’re so excited that you don’t even care that it’s the least comfortable chair in the world. Airport seating hasn’t been upgraded since airports were invented. NOBODY has ever gotten comfortable in one of those seats. Not even the guy who is sleeping curled up in the fetal position because his flight got cancelled. The gate seats are objectively less comfortable than the seats IN the plane and that seems borderline impossible but it’s true. So…how about make the gate areas bigger by removing about 99% of the Hudson Book Stores that are really just candy stores surrounded by books because NOBODY reads books anymore and then idk.. make the chairs at the gate have a little collapsable foot rest which people can tuck their luggage underneath.
3) More Places To Charge Your Phone
Airports have gotten better with this, but ORD still objectively stinks at it. The excitement of getting a place to sit instantly goes away when you realize your shitty uncomfortable chair doesn’t have an outlet near it. So you have to get up, walk four gates away just to find an outlet that is on a wall which and you sit on the floor next to some other miserable traveler in the exact same boat as you.
So that’s it. Find a way to make me less hungry, more comfortable, and with my electronics charged. That’s really all anyone needs and there’s no way that will cost 8 BILLION dollars. I don’t care what the airport looks like as it disappears behind me. I just want to be comfortable while I’m in there.