Getting ready to take a flight out of Dulles International Airport for the holidays? Here’s a stat that may exhaust you even before you lace up your shoes and head to the airport. Dulles has the second-longest airport walking distance in the U.S., according to Kuru Footwear.
The shoe company measured the top 10 largest and smallest airports by land area. It then analyzed airport maps and Google Maps to determine how far it was from each terminal to the nearest and farthest gates.
It found the walking distance at Dulles, where there are 123 gates, was 1.62 miles. (Tired yet?)
Of course, if that holiday trip takes you to Texas, where everything is expansive, get ready for even more walking. The Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport ranks first as the airport with the longest airport walking distance at 2.16 miles. Coming in third is George Bush International Airport in Houston at 1.52 miles.
The shortest airport walks happen in Lexington, Kentucky, at Blue Grass Airport, which has 16 gates, and a walking distance of 0.11 miles. The second shortest is New York’s Westchester County Airport at 0.12 miles and six gates. Harrisburg International in Pennsylvania is third at 0.13 miles and 12 gates.
What Do Travelers Think About Walking?
A Kuru survey of 800 people found a some of interesting tidbits about their travel habits.
- Those long walks don’t keep people from particular airports. Just 27 percent said the long walk deterred them.
- Just 40 percent are annoyed by long walks to departure gates.
- About 35 percent spend less than an hour walking around the airport before flights, while 33 percent spend an hour.
Not surprisingly, 74 percent of Americans feel they walk more when traveling, 66 percent wear sneakers when traveling, and 46 percent said their feet hurt from the extra walking. The survey had a margin of error of plus or minus 3 percent.
Of course, at Dulles, one of the world’s best airports, forget being tired from walking. We know you may be striding across the airport just to try out all of the new food options.
Feature image by steheap/stock.adobe.com
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