I heard the hype while living in Denver nearly 20 years ago. $2.5 billion (turned into $5 billion) was necessary to avoid all of the current airport’s problems during snowstorms. Mayer Federico Pena lead the charge with his reward coming later – the highway to the new airport (DIA) is named “Pena Boulevard”.

Mike Boyd tells the “rest of the story” in the Grinch Comes Clean:

“All Weather Airport? Oh, That Was Just ‘Hype’…” …Along With Most Of The Other Stuff DIA PromisThis Christmas, it wasn’t just chestnuts that got roasted on an open fire.
Denver’s “all-weather” airport, the one that was built to unclog the Western skies, the one that was going to be the glorious technological beacon for all future airports, got roasted big-time in the national media. Justifiably.

Denver International got cooked on something called “the truth.”

For almost two days before Christmas, the airport was shut down due to snow. At most times of the year, and at most other airports, this would have been not much more than a page three human interest story, with interviews of passengers stranded like refugees in a big terminal, being asked really deep questions, like, “How long have you been standing in line?” or “When do you think you’ll get home?” Or, “Gee, you gotta lot of luggage there.” Anything to fill a 90-second piece that’s been done dozens of times before.

(more…)