The U.S. Department of Transportation’s Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) dedicated a new air traffic control tower at Charlotte Douglas International Airport in Charlotte, N.C.
Construction on the tower started in 2016. The new tower is not only environmentally sustainable but, at 370-feet tall, is the second tallest tower in the country. Charlotte is the sixth-busiest airport in the country.
“Aviation is an invaluable part of our American life and our national economy. The new, taller control tower will enable the airport to continue to expand its flight operations to grow alongside the vibrant Charlotte economy,” said FAA Deputy Administrator A. Bradley Mims.
The airport’s operational growth, new air traffic control technology, and addition of new runways and taxiways made the height and size of the old tower, commissioned in 1979, obsolete.
In addition to its height, the new tower has an 850-square-foot tower cab that provides air traffic controllers to have a bird’s-eye view of the airfield. At its base sits a 42,000-square-foot building that houses expanded terminal radar approach control (TRACON) to handle flights into and out of the Charlotte airspace. Both features are designed with current and future operations in mind, the FAA said.
“The commissioning of the new air traffic control tower by the Federal Aviation Administration is a testament to the importance of Charlotte in the National Airspace System,” said the airport’s Chief Executive Officer Haley Gentry. “The tower is equipped with the latest state-of-the-art NextGen technology to keep up with the current and future demand of our growing airfield. This modern infrastructure is another display of the strong partnership we have at CLT, and we are grateful to the FAA for this investment to make air traffic more efficient.”
Nearly 180 FAA employees work in the tower and on TRACON – 136 in air traffic services and 43 in technical operations installing and maintaining the equipment. The approximately $94 million tower became operational in late February 2022.