LAWA Celebrates the Ground-Breaking of LAX’s Midfield Satellite Concourse South

New concourse to add eight gates to airport through first-of-its-kind off-site construction and relocation building technique

Buro Happold LAX Addition — Photo courtesy of Buro Happold

At a ceremony attended by members of the Los Angeles Board of Airport Commissioners, Los Angeles World Airports executives and staff, and members of the design and construction team, the newest addition to Los Angeles International Airport’s multi-billion-dollar capital improvement program broke ground July 25. The project, Midfield Satellite Concourse South, is an extension of the west gates at Tom Bradley International Terminal and will add approximately 150,000 square feet and eight gates for narrowbody aircraft. Utilizing a first-of-its-kind construction technique called off-site construction and relocation, MSC South will be built in nine segments roughly a mile and a half away from the project’s site and then carefully delivered and assembled in place. The OCR technique is both innovative and adaptive, saving public funds and time with a high degree of building control and supervision.

“It is a testament to LAWA’s consistent focus on innovation that LAX’s new Midfield Satellite Concourse South is being delivered with a first-of-its-kind off-site construction and relocation technique that will enable an accelerated project timeline, save money and be flexible enough to adapt to meet future needs if required,” said Justin Erbacci, chief executive officer at LAWA. “MSC South is original in both the way it is being constructed and in its overall design, which celebrates our transformation while paying tribute to the architectural legacy of our airport.”

MSC South represents another example of LAWA’s dedication to design excellence. Architecturally, the concourse creates a sense of place that celebrates and pays homage to the city of Los Angeles, with elements of the design strongly influenced by notable modernist homes. This is especially true of the project’s exterior brise soleil system – a solar shading feature on the concourse’s façade – which frames sightlines of the surrounding Los Angeles landscape. Inside MSC South, passengers’ comfort and well-being are of the utmost importance, with the interior feeling more like a domestic space than a traditional airport concourse.

MSC South’s brise soleil system will also enable passive cooling and energy conservation, helping the project achieve its Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design silver accreditation goal. As with all LAWA transformation projects, the team delivering MSC South comprises local workers, with more than 30 percent of the team coming from Los Angeles’ local workforce.

“Drawing inspiration from California Modernism, the design for LAX’s MSC South captures a feeling of ease, simple but functional design and timeless beauty,” said Matt Ducharme, principal and West Coast design leader at Woods Bagot. “A great example of this is realized in the concourse’s exterior brise soleil system that links to the building's interior ceiling, creating a strong sense of place and indoor-to-outdoor connection for guests.”

“LAX’s MSC South is amazing because of what we’ve figured out how to do together: deliver the job faster without sacrificing precision and care by building the concourse off-site then meticulously moving the segments into place,” said John Finn, president of W.E. O’Neil Construction. “Yes, it will look cool! But another major aspect is the speed at which we are able to realize the project while still maintaining the very highest construction standards.”

Enabling work for the project is now underway, with significant project completion planned for 2025. Interested parties can learn more about LAX’s campus-wide transformation and subscribe for project updates at bit.ly/LAX-Transformation.