{"id":296182,"date":"2025-10-12T02:33:11","date_gmt":"2025-10-12T02:33:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/296182\/"},"modified":"2025-10-12T02:33:11","modified_gmt":"2025-10-12T02:33:11","slug":"san-diego-airport-boosted-by-new-terminal-1-rise-in-international-routes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/296182\/","title":{"rendered":"San Diego airport boosted by new Terminal 1, rise in international routes"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"New<\/a>Baggage claim at the new Terminal 1 in San Diego\u2019s airport, which is experiencing growth despite uncertain times for tourism. (File photo by Chris Stone\/Times of San Diego)<\/p>\n

California has taken a hit due to the slip in international travelers who want to visit the states. But San Diego is bucking the trend.<\/p>\n

While foreign air travel is dwindling throughout California, San Diego International Airport<\/a> saw a 5.5% boost in global passengers over the past year, with the addition of more international flights.<\/p>\n

In May the airport launched direct flights to Amsterdam through KLM Royal Dutch Airlines<\/a>, and in June it introduced Copa Airlines, with a flight to Panama<\/a> that opens South America to West Coast travelers.\u00a0 Last year it bumped its nonstop flights to London from once to twice daily.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Plus, the strong dollar means that more San Diego travelers are flying to destinations such as Europe and Canada, offsetting losses from incoming international flights, said Hampton Brown, vice president of revenue for the airport.<\/p>\n

\u201cRight now, we\u2019re noticing that a lot of the international services that we have, actually are being carried by U.S people going abroad, rather than foreigners coming here,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Canadian air travel to California slipped nearly 38% between August 2024 and 2025, according to data from\u00a0Visit California<\/a>, a nonprofit tourism marketing agency. That prompted Gov. Gavin Newsom to mount a marketing campaign to woo back those visitors with promises of\u00a0warmth and welcome in the Golden State.<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cSure, you-know-who is trying to stir things up back in D.C., but don\u2019t let that ruin your beach plans,\u201d Newsom\u2019s office stated.<\/p>\n

Canadians aren\u2019t the only tourists taking a pass. Visits from Japan have dropped 20% and from Australia by nearly 15%. Forecasts for 2025 predict a 9.2% decline in international trips to California.<\/p>\n

Overall, Los Angeles International Airport saw a 2.4 percent drop in passengers between June 2024 and 2025, following the catastrophic fires in January and\u00a0immigration raids in June. San Diego International, though, saw a smaller decline of .6% for that time period.<\/p>\n

In May,\u00a0Visit California<\/a> projected a 1% drop in visits to the state, in the first year-over-year decline since the pandemic. San Diego tourism experts similarly predicted that\u00a0visitation would flatten\u00a0this year, as trade wars and market fluctuations lead people to pull back on travel spending.\u00a0<\/p>\n

But San Diego airport officials hope to weather that downturn, and not only with new flights and routes. Another factor working in San Diego\u2019s favor is the new Terminal 1<\/a>, which opened last month and is part of a $3.8 billion improvement plan. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe mix has sort of helped us out a little bit in the sense that where it\u2019s dipped in one place it has sort of increased in other places,\u201d\u00a0said San Diego County Regional Airport Authority Chair Gil Cabrera<\/p>\n

The agency estimates that the new terminal and other additions will generate $7.4 billion in sales and $127 million in local tax revenues between 2010 and 2029.<\/p>\n

READ NEXT\n\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Baggage claim at the new Terminal 1 in San Diego\u2019s airport, which is experiencing growth despite uncertain times…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":296183,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5134],"tags":[5229,1582,276,16731,63238,151266,3549,16733,151267,7264,114249,5331,67,586,132,5230,68,2969],"class_list":{"0":"post-296182","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-san-diego","8":"tag-america","9":"tag-ca","10":"tag-california","11":"tag-copa-airlines","12":"tag-international-travel","13":"tag-klm-royal-dutch-airlines","14":"tag-san-diego","15":"tag-san-diego-international-airport","16":"tag-san-diego-regional-airport-authority","17":"tag-sandiego","18":"tag-terminal-1","19":"tag-tourism","20":"tag-united-states","21":"tag-united-states-of-america","22":"tag-unitedstates","23":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","24":"tag-us","25":"tag-usa"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115358859560932056","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/296182","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=296182"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/296182\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/296183"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=296182"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=296182"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=296182"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}