Today’s Daily Breeze brings a story about how Northwest Airlines is moving out of LAX Terminal 2 into Terminal 5 with Delta. This started me thinking…
I grew up in Westchester, as my recent activity of consolidating my father’s photo albums has reminded me. We first lived on 90th St, about two streets over from where the LAX boundary now is (originally, there were houses there all the way over to something like 94th or 96th, which no longer exists). Later we moved to 80th St in Playa Del Rey, when they first constructed those houses in 1966. Again, I remember vacant lots, and friends living over in the hills next to the beach, all of which have been taken over by the airport. At Elementary School we learned to tell the planes flying overhead.
I mention this because I grew up with the airport, and thus the history of the terminals interests me. Some have been quite stable, such as Terminal 4 and Terminal 7. Others contain the ghosts of airlines past, such as Western at Terminal 5, TWA at Terminal 3, and loads of international folks at Terminal 2. I still miss PSA at Terminal 1. Now, with NW departing 2 for 5, Terminal 2 will be another mostly empty terminal, with a succession of odd renters. Is it destined to become another Terminal 6? Time will tell.
So much at LAX is gone. The long walkways to the satellites. The tunnels between 4-5-6 and 7. The Imperial terminal. The bubble building between Terminals 1 and 2. But I guess that’s how LA is.
