Dive Brief:

•    San Francisco International Airport will postpone more than 20 construction projects in order to defer $550 million in debt service as passenger activity continues to crater during the COVID-19 pandemic.
•    The final phase of Harvey Milk Terminal 1 and new North Check-In lobby area will be postponed by at least six months, along with interior mixed-use offices that are a part of the airport’s Courtyard 3 Connector project, SFO announced in a release.
•    These new delays follow the six-month deferment of the $1 billion Terminal 3 West project that was announced in April, and was extended for at least another six months in October, according to the statement.

Dive Insight:

The additional work stoppages at SFO, the country’s seventh busiest airport, are the latest in a string of shutdowns at construction projects that were underway across the country, as new daily COVID-19 cases skyrocketed past 145,000 and hospitalizations hit 60,000 nationally this week, both all-time highs.  

In October, plans were put on hold for a $9.4 billion petrochemical plant in Louisiana, while manufacturer Foxconn pulled back from starting to build an announced $10 billion factory in Wisconsin.

Those shutterings followed the stop of construction of a movie theater and concert venue after foundation excavation was completed at the $1 billion Nashville Yards, effectively leaving an gaping hole in the middle of America’s 24th largest city.

And in the first week of November, construction on the second tower of the $1.6 billion Oceanwide Center project, also in San Francisco, was stopped due to the impacts of COVID-19 as well.

SFO’s new woes come as Americans continue to decide against air travel and its enclosed, confined spaces, which medical experts say represent the types of environments where COVID-19 is most easily spread.

The Transportation Security Administration has only screened more than 1 million daily passengers nationally once, on Oct. 18, since the pandemic began. In 2019, more between 2 million and 2.5 million passengers routinely passed through the country’s airports every day. It hit a low of 87,000 April 14.

That drop in passengers, and the resulting revenue losses, has led to construction stopping at a number of airports across the country, including ones at Dallas-Fort Worth, Chicago O’Hare and Orlando.

But even with the virus surging and winter on its way, there are bright spots. Turner-Flatiron announced the awarding of a $2.27 billion contract at San Diego International Airport in September, with construction scheduled to begin in late 2021.  

Original Information source: https://www.constructiondive.com/news