What do the Super Bowl, the word “tween” and Terminal 1 at the San Diego International Airport have in common?
They all originated in 1967.
Rob Winn, 69, was a tween when Terminal 1 opened — and waiting for his ride in the forecourt of the Terminal 1 Friday, he said the terminal has been adequate.
“It’s been satisfactory,” he said of his experience flying in and out of Terminal 1, adding that he doesn’t know much about the amenities at the new terminal, which is scheduled to open its first of two phases in September.
The current Terminal 1 — which has 14 gates in use — will be demolished after the opening of the first phase of the new terminal.
The first phase will include 19 gates in an “attactive, modern, and more efficient” facility, according to the airport.
There will be 30 restaurants and stores, and a slew of public art projects, including a large jellyfish sculpture in the concourse by artist Matthew Mazzotta.
Two abstract sculptures by artist and academic Walter J. Hood — the larger of the two is 40 feet tall — are being constructed near the entry-ramp to the new terminal’s ground transportation plaza, which opened July 16.
The airport also announced Tuesday that it is opening a new three-lane roadway on Friday to provide an uninterrupted, high-capacity route directly to the airport’s Terminals 1 and 2.
A parking plaza with more than 5,200 parking spaces and was finalized in June, and the second phase of the new terminal, which adds 11 gates, is scheduled for completion in 2028.
The airport says the new terminal is necessary to accommodate more travelers.
In 2024, more than 25 million passengers traveled through the San Diego airport, compared to 2.5 million when Terminal 1 opened in 1967.
The airport estimates that in 2035, the number of annual travelers through both terminals will increase to 39 million — which is the volume of passengers that the new terminal will allow the airport to accommodate.
The new Terminal 1 project is spearheaded by the San Diego County Regional Airport Authority, a planning agency that manages the airport’s day-to-day operations and serves as the long-term planning agency for air travel in the region.
The new Terminal 1 is a $3.8 billion project funded by leases and operating agreements with airlines, as well as federal grants — $75 million so far — via the 2021 Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act’s Airport Terminals Program.
The airport authority has pledged to implement public transit infrastructure projects at the airport that are proposed by SANDAG, the county’s planning agency.
The architectural history of the existing Terminal 1
In his essay about the architectural style of the current Terminal 1, airport terminal architect Joseph Barden writes about the building’s Brutalist aesthetic, which is characterized by raw concrete and imposing, blocky shapes that reflected the taste of the age.
According to Barden, Terminal 1 was built before jet bridges, just as commercial aviation went mainstream in America.
Barden writes that the terminal includes two-story rotundas because of the benefits of parking multiple airplanes on a diameter.
“The space needed for increased passenger seating, restrooms and amenities ultimately made a rotunda configuration less preferable for subsequent terminal facilities at SAN and across the globe,” Barden wrote.
Unusually shaped buildings whose size and power is amplified by rough surfaces are defining aspects of Brutalism, according to a professional society for architects.
According to Barden, the waffle-pattern in the concrete facade and overhang at Terminal 1 is an inviting element for travelers gathered in the forecourt.
Terminal 1 is “a unique construction type floating on slender dendriform, or treelike columns,” Barden writes, adding that the terminal’s architects might have been influenced by Frank Lloyd Wright’s Johnson Wax Headquarters.
According to the Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation, at the Johnson Wax Headquarters — which features dendriform columns like those at the airport — Wright combined “traditions of communal organization with contemporary materials and structures to shelter new social and economic activities.”
The foundation says that at the Johnson Wax Headquarters, the architect practiced “radical conservatism” by looking at the past while imagining new possibilities.
The thin, tree-like columns supporting the overhang create what Barden calls “[essentially] a large canopy for solar shade.”
