This aerial view of Los Angeles International Airport was taken in 1963, two years after the main terminal complex opened, and with lots of empty land around it. These days the layout is pretty much the same, except that the parking lot is now a four-story structure, and a huge international terminal opened in 1984, just before the 1984 Olympics. But here’s my question: those round buildings where the planes are parked, how did passengers get to them? Surely they didn’t walk across the tarmac…?
This is a 2021 satellite view of LAX:
Those round structures where the planes are parked have been replaced with larger structures to accommodate more planes, but people got to them by walking underneath and going up an escalator or elevator.
Thanks, Gordon.
To see exactly what walking through these LAX tunnels looked like, check out on YouTube the opening scene of ‘Point Blank’ featuring the loud stamping of Lee Marvin’s footsteps to prepare the audience for his revenge-driven character. Aptly, the character’s name is “Walker”. As Carroll O’Connor playing Brewster famously exclaims: “You’re a very bad man, Walker, a very destructive man!”
Correction: Lee Marvin’s airport tunnel walk happens about 10 minutes into ‘Point Blank’. Enjoy!
The original satellite structures of T3, T4, T5, T6 and T7 still exist to this day. They’ve been added on to and some interior upgrades have been made, but they are the original structures and they can be seen from any satellite photo.
Those exact structures have not been replaced, with the exception of Terminal 2. 3,4,5,6 and 7 are still there. They’ve just been added onto over the years.
https://airlinegeeks.com/2017/12/19/laxs-long-standing-history-with-inter-terminal-underground-tunnels/
I almost can’t believe that’s only 1963, but I guess it was pretty open back then. I can barely remember the old Airport Village that was nearby.
What and where was the Airport Village? A bunch of restaurants and stores, I assume?
Going by my hazy childhood memories. It was close to where Dinah’s is now. I couldn’t remember exactly where, so I googled. It must have been south of Dinah’s on Sepulveda, because it was in Culver City.
Pictures show the the hamburger place that was there. I remember it fondly.
North side of Centinela, west of Sepulveda.
Hamburger Handout (19c hamburgers!) at Sepulveda and Centinela?
http://blogs.dailybreeze.com/history/2009/08/12/hamburger-handout/
That’s the place. I used to go there when I was a kid.
Yeah, that’s it!
Holy God, if I could only have a parallel life where I would be 10 years old and living in 1963 L.A., dropping my father off at the airport early Mondy morning for a workweek’s absence before he returned on Friday night.
Heh, when I was in high school, we used to actually go to the airport to hang out and goof around for fun.
These days I dread it.
The odd thing about LAX is there was no T1 for years, but there were Terminals 2-8 when the “Jet Age” LAX opened in the early 60s. I’ve never understood this.