Holiday Travelers to See Updates Amid Ongoing Construction at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport
SEATAC, Wash. — Travelers passing through Seattle-Tacoma International Airport (SEA) this holiday season may notice several changes as some long-awaited upgrades are now complete, while other projects continue.
For over a year, SEA has been undergoing extensive renovations to enhance its facilities. “We’ve been asking passengers for patience over the last two years as we worked through construction,” said Alan Olson, program lead for the Port of Seattle’s collaboration with Alaska Airlines. “Now we can finally offer travelers a glimpse of what they’ve been waiting for.”
One of the completed projects includes a new ticketing lobby for Alaska Airlines, featuring updated technology designed to speed up passenger processing and ease congestion. According to Lea Kautzman, Alaska Airlines’ Managing Director for Seattle Station Guest Services, the new lobby will include automated bag drop stations along the window wall, streamlining the check-in process. “This is all about guest convenience, helping them drop bags quickly and head to their checkpoints,” Kautzman explained.
Alaska Airlines has already noticed faster transaction times with a newly introduced bridge-way for ticketing and bag check-in, completed earlier this summer, which has helped reduce wait times.
Elsewhere in the airport, crews are focusing on Security Checkpoint 5, where construction scaffolding has limited access for the past year. While the checkpoint upgrade is expected to take over a year to complete, the airport is planning to open a new checkpoint — Security Checkpoint 1 — on the south end of the Baggage Claim level to improve traffic flow in the interim.
Originally built to accommodate around 25 million passengers annually, SEA now serves more than twice that number, necessitating these major infrastructure updates to better meet the needs of today’s travelers in both the short and long term.