Memphis International Airport is scrapping a high-speed baggage screening system because of diminished passenger traffic volumes at the soon-to-be-former Delta Air Lines hub.
Memphis-Shelby County Airport Authority officials said Thursday that lower passenger numbers don't justify the anticipated $1.5 million to $2 million annual cost of operating and maintaining the system.
The action, announced in an airport board meeting, was another example of Memphis International's decline as a passenger facility. Flights were down 28 percent in May from a year earlier, to 131 daily departures, and Delta is coming with another 30-flight cut Sept. 3, signaling the official end of Memphis as a major airline hub.
Airport officials have been roundly criticized in the community for proceeding with design and construction of a $122 million parking deck and rental car facility after Delta had begun slashing its Memphis presence. The parking facility was completed this spring.
The airport is pinning hopes for attracting new carriers and service on Southwest Airlines, scheduled to begin operations in Memphis in November. Board chairman Jack Sammons said after Delta announced its latest cuts, airport officials were invited to visit with Southwest executives in Texas about the carrier's plans for Memphis.
"You have senior vice presidents at Southwest that are really pumped up about Memphis," Sammons said. "They think Memphis is the kind of market that's a sweet spot for them." Airport and Greater Memphis Chamber officials are urging Memphians to join Southwest's RapidRewards program and sign up for Southwest-affiliated credit cards.
Southwest initially plans flights from Memphis to Chicago Midway, Baltimore Washington, Orlando, Tampa and Houston-Hobby, while ending Atlanta routes served by subsidiary AirTran.
Sammons noted one Southwest flight would be the equivalent of three Delta flights, since Delta is pulling 50-seat regional jets out of Memphis and Southwest will serve the city with 143-passenger aircraft.
Because the in-line baggage screening system hasn't moved out of the design stage, cancellation of the project also saves the airport on construction cost.
Vice president of operations John Greaud said the airport would have picked up about 40 percent of a $21 million design-build contract with W.G. Yates & Sons Construction Co. It was unclear how much money had been obligated for design at this point.
Plans called for a fully automated labyrinth of conveyor belts and explosives-detection equipment, hidden out of public view, to serve the airport's passenger airlines. The principal funding was to be a $16 million grant, announced in September 2011, from the federal Transportation Security Administration.
Airports including Nashville, Chicago O'Hare and Dallas-Fort Worth already have in-line systems.
Greaud said the maintenance cost was to be borne completely by the airport, and that the price tag proved steep because of the system's sophisticated mechanical and information technology components.
The airlines will have to make do instead with their current system of scanning checked luggage behind the ticket counter.
Copyright 2013 - The Commercial Appeal, Memphis, Tenn.
