Officials at San Francisco International Airport are bracing for a slow recovery that entails the return of just 40% of the passengers that used the airport before COVID-19 put a halt to most travel. The airport expects that the number of travelers won't ramp up to pre-pandemic levels for up to six years, with airlines holding off on reinstating flights.
Carly Graf, a transportation reporter at the San Francisco Examiner, wrote that the number of travelers that passed through the airport in 2020 plummeted by 16.4 million, a 71% drop compared to the prior year.
Graf told KQED that people think of airports as “well to-do, well-off entities,” but that a year of relative inactivity has devastated SFO.
“(I)t’s important to remember that they employ a tremendous number of people,” she said. “They create a lot of jobs, and there are contractors and companies operating within them that are really hurting.”
About 46,000 people worked at the airport before the pandemic, but airport officials say up to half of those employees have been furloughed or have lost their jobs.
The airport has also been reducing expenses by delaying projects, limiting new hires and restructuring contracts.
Next week, San Francisco’s airport commission will vote to accept $46 million in federal relief funds to help offset losses from the steep decline in passengers.