Kirk Tags Into O'Hare Expansion Fight

By Prescott Carlson in News on Jan 15, 2011 10:00PM

Mayor Daley is using the waning days of his reign over Chicago to make one last push to move the O'Hare Airport expansion project towards completion, and he's enlisted freshman U.S. Senator Mark Kirk to help out. According to ABC-7, Kirk met with Chicago's aviation commissioner Rosemarie Andolino on Friday to get the scoop on the progress (or lack thereof) that's being made on runway expansion, which has been receiving pushback from the airport's major airlines, United and American. The two airlines do not want to provide the funds for an "ill-conceived" project. That's where Kirk comes in:

"The next set of meetings I'll have is with the airlines," Kirk said. "We're in a difficult relationship, I understand, with American -- better with United. I think Senator Durbin and I want to rebuild that partnership to make sure we're growing."

Despite clearing away a large swath of Bensenville homes, the runway expansion is far from completed but Daley remains "very confident," reportedly saying, "This is important 'cause we're not building runways for the airlines today. We're building runways for passengers so there are no delays in bad weather or anything like that."

Those airlines Daley isn't expanding O'Hare for would be on the hook for $100 million of a $1 billion bond issue, an amount they feel may be too much given the "recent and rapid adverse changes in the commercial aviation industry."