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| JFK NEWS |
| JFKIDS PORT CARNIVAL |
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JFKids Port celebrated their annual carnival
on August 21st and it was a fantastic and
fun-filled day for everyone. Over seventy people
attended including students, their friends
and families. All had full afternoon of hot dogs,
popcorn, cotton candy and other fun refreshments.
The children enjoyed pony rides, water
slides, and clowns. There was also face painting
and fun games where everyone enjoyed
winning a prize. The raffle raised money for the
school, thanks to generous donations from Jet
Blue, North American Air, Anthony’s Flowers,
Arturo’s Ristorante, and many other businesses
in the JFK and surrounding communities.
JFKids Port would like to extend an extra
special thank you to their Parent Teacher Committee
that took the greatest role in sponsoring
and organizing the event. JFKids Port is very
proud of how their enrollment has grown and
how the parents of the little students are
involved in all the activities and educational
curriculum on a continuing basis. Many thanks
to the JFK Community!
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| GUINNESS WORLD RECORD SET
IN JFK TERMINAL 4 |
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Standing between Janet Holden and Rita
Nederman of JFK Terminal 4 is Ashrita
Furman, who had just set the
Guinness Book Records for pushing
an orange one mile with his nose in
24 minutes, 36 seconds, on August
12, 2004. |
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| TSA SCREENERS - SOLDIERS
PRESENT US FLAGS FROM IRAQ |
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At ceremony in Building 111 at JFK,
members of TSA SCREENERS presented
two flags to William Hall, Federal Security
Director.
The first flag was presented by
Sergeant Juan Diaz still on active duty with
the National Guard. This flag had flown at
Camp Victory in Bagdad. The second flag
has flown over the Bagdad airport.
This flag was presented by
SERGEANTS: Donald Basso, Lance Bryer
and David Carmona who were part of an
MP Reservist Group serving in Iraq. After
their tours in Iraq all are now serving in
the Reserves and have return to their normal
TSA duties.
Federal Security Director Hall made a
very moving tribute to the returning soldiers,
“Thank you for your unwavering
commitment to keep us safe whether performing
your duties with the TSA or in
the battlefield.“ |
| THE RESURGENCE OF JFK |
Reprinted from the JFKCS E-News Bulletin found at www.JFKCorporateSquare.com
by Craig Jenks • Craig Jenks is President of New York-based Airline/Aircraft Projects, Inc |
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JFK International Airport is about to
benefit from the creation of an Airport Village
development in Jamaica, Queens
called JFK Corporate Square (JFKCS),
located just minutes from the Airport. It
has the potential to match and perhaps
supercede similar developments at other
international airports.
Strong airport passenger |
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traffic
growth, bustling business activities near
the airport and the broader phenomenon
of an economically healthy metropolis are
clearly intertwined. Very strong hub airports
such as Frankfurt or Atlanta have
demonstrably boosted their cities' entire
economies. At airports like Amsterdam,
Singapore and Dubai, the strength of the
local economy, the quality of amenities at
or near the airport and booming airline
travel all are mutually reinforcing. While New York City achieved prosperity
many decades before air
travel had any economic
impact, the most dramatic linkages
may be yet to come. But
let's look first a bit closer at
this concept of economic activity
near the airport, and how
so-called Airport Cities and
Airport Villages are springing up around numerous national and international
cities.
Amsterdam (Schiphol) Airport offers
its definition of an Airport Village or City
as: "an efficient multi-modal hub for air,
road and rail transport, offering roundthe-clock facilities for business and leisure
(shopping, restaurants, bars, hotels, information
and communication technology,
office and conference space) whether
they are visitors (passengers and staff or
just people meeting and greeting passengers)
or locally-based international businesses".
This is not a simple definition, but
nor is it a simple phenomenon. It is, perhaps,
easier to say: the Airport City is
whatever has been added for the convenience,
primarily for passengers, but
also for employees and the non-traveling
public, that is optional -- that could
have been added or not. A taxi dispatcher
is not optional. Nor is a cargo facility.
But quality, proximate and convenient
hotels, retail and business office complexes
-- these are optional. Starkly, some airports
have more or less of them.
Each Airport City plays on the
strengths that it can bring to bear. The
emergent JFKCS complex at Jamaica is
uniquely endowed with a real, street-level
urban feel just minutes by AirTrain from the
Airport. Here are some examples of Airport
City developments; planned or already
completed. Many of them clearly leverage
proximity to airport-city rail transit:
London's Heathrow Express has transformed
London's Paddington Station
from a neglected backwater to a prime
magnet for international corporate
office space with a proliferation of
"cool" passenger amenities including a
wide range of hotels, bars, restaurants
and retail.
Hong Kong Airport recently unveiled
details of a multi-purpose SkyPlaza
linked to the Airport Express railway
station. The development will be the
gateway for SkyCity, the new commercial
district that will also be home to
Hong Kong's second exhibition center.
Mumbai Airport has become a powerful
magnet for business location. In close
proximity are as many 4 and 5-Star
hotels as in the main downtown areas.
Dubai, the very rapidly growing hub airport
in the Middle East, is planning an
airport village development to be called
"Festival City".
Seoul's Inchon Airport plans a Leisure
Town to include condominiums, a hotel
and a golf course.
Denver's International Airport Partnership
is promoting a development near
Denver Airport -- "equivalent to an
entire new city".
Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport
has unleashed massive development,
including Las Colinas ( 27 million
square feet) which is larger than most
downtown areas and is geared to businesses
and residents needing quick airport
access.
Detroit Metro Airport will soon open Pinnacle
Aeropark, a 19-million sq. ft. office,
technology and retail development.
Brisbane Airport Corporation will spend
$200 million in a diversification that will
make it a major player in the city's
retail, business, sport and hotel areas.
JFK International Airport has not had
-- to date -- a development of this type.
The reasons are profoundly structural; the
City of New York itself was in prolonged
economic stagnation and intermittent fiscal
crisis, with massive capital program
funding deficiencies and an often negative
tourist image from about 1970 to well over
a decade. This period happened to coincide
with the decline of New York's airline
industry role as an international gateway:
Pan Am and TWA declined as their JFK
transatlantic hub systems faced competition
from more efficient hubs such as
Atlanta, Washington and Chicago. From
the late 1980s to the late 1990s, JFK's total
traffic barely grew. The Port Authority of
New York and New Jersey was constrained
throughout the period by New York City
and State financial problems on the one
hand, and the weaknesses of JFK's largest
carriers on the other. The result: JFK did
not have an industry-leading role… nor
did its environs or its hotels surge forward
in anything resembling Airport City mode.
Recently, JFK has fared much better.
Key airlines have been strategically targeting
the Airport for growth, by adding capacity:
JetBlue, which only started operations
in 2000, has undergone tremendous
growth.
Delta and American have developed
services to Europe that largely fill the
gap left by Pan Am and TWA.
Inbound European carriers have been
growing strongly at JFK; in the key
JFK-London (Heathrow) market,
British Airways now offers a remarkable
total of seven daily flights, and its rival
Virgin Atlantic, is up to three daily
flights.
Asian carriers have defined JFK as a
prime target for new non-stop services
with ultra-long haul aircraft; Beijing and
Dubai (a gateway to India) services are
in place, and Cathay Pacific's Hong
Kong non-stop starts in July 2004. |
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Concomitantly:
JFK's terminal facilities have been
strikingly improved by Port Authority
and other investment.
AirTrain has opened, connecting JFK to
Jamaica in just eight minutes.
Jamaica, Queens, after a relentless,
long-term campaign by the Greater
Jamaica Development Corporation and
other stakeholders, has become a stable
neighborhood, perhaps even ready for
the "cool" label already spreading like
wildfire in parts of Queens and Brooklyn
that until |
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recently were backwaters.
The improvements in Jamaica have to
be seen to be believed.
Jamaica's JFK Corporate Square redevelopment
will feature a full-service
hotel that will compete for transient meeting
and convention business similar to
other airport hotels at Washington-Dulles,
Atlanta, Chicago-O'Hare and London-
Heathrow. JFKCS's convenience as an
international business location will be
greatly enhanced by this hotel. The ease
with which a business person can fly in --
have a meeting at JFKCS - and fly out, will
then be as good or better than comparable
large airports.
All of these changes converge in the
JFK Corporate Square project, described
elsewhere in this E-Bulletin. With little or
no Airport City-type investment nor land
available in its immediate environs, JFK
will have just such a development -- not a
tortuous airport limo or taxi ride away, but
a very reliable AirTrain ride away -- in a
pedestrian-friendly urban environment. |
| AVIATION ENTHUSIASTS – SAVE THE DATE |
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The annual “Wings and Wheels Expo” is to be held on Saturday and Sunday, September
25 and 26 at Teterboro Airport. This fundraiser for the New Jersey Aviation Hall
of Fame and Museum will feature exhibits of military and general aviation aircraft,
antique car displays and tours of the Hall of Fame and Museum. For the younger crowd,
there will be pedal cars, pony rides, clowns, gifts and more. For more information visit
www.njahof.org or call 201 288-6344. |
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