7.52 passengers per 10 square meters of terminal space, that’s what the North Carolina airport that data shows is the second most crowded nationwide, sees daily. Our friends at S Money researched the floor size of passenger terminals for 128 of the world’s busiest airports. They took that data and then compared this with the average daily passenger numbers each airport receives. This led them to the data of the most crowded airports around the world. They also refined this data for just North America which is what was of interest to me. I, as am most US citizens, more often fly domestically than internationally. Though I’ll take an excuse to go international no questions asked!
The most crowded US airports include several of the ones you’d most expect. Places like Atlanta and LAX welcome huge numbers of passengers so it makes sense that they would be included on this list. But would you have guessed a North Carolina airport not only made the list but almost topped it? At first, I was surprised but then I remembered the state of the airport when I returned from Florida a few weeks ago. Yes, the crowds were the result of a complete afternoon of delays. I was still shocked at the number of people and lack of space to even exit the terminal and the airport.
I’d never seen anything quite like it, and hope I don’t for a long time! Think you know which airport I’m talking about? Keep reading to see the top 9 most crowded airports in North America. Data is provided by S Money. You can read their full study and methodology here. Maybe that two hours early rule needs to be extended a little bit. You can never be too early at the airport in my opinion. Happy traveling!
