Portland Airport station

Portland Airport is a light rail station in Portland, Oregon, United States, served by TriMet as part of the MAX Light Rail system. Situated at Portland International Airport, it is the eastern terminus of the Red Line, which connects the airport, downtown Portland, and Beaverton. The station is located at the ground floor of the airport's main passenger terminal near the southern end of the arrivals hall and baggage claim area.

Portland Airport station was built as part of the Airport MAX project. Construction began in July 2000, and it opened on September 10, 2001. Trains serve the station for 22 hours daily with headways of 15 minutes during most of the day. It recorded an average of 1,705 weekday boardings in spring 2023.

History
Portland's regional transit agency, TriMet, had served Portland International Airport with bus routes since 1970. In 1986, the same year TriMet began operating the Metropolitan Area Express (MAX), planners from the Portland metropolitan area's regional government, Metro, proposed a light rail extension to the airport. Early plans envisioned a line running from Clackamas to the airport via Interstate 205 (I-205) using rights-of-way provided by the I-205 busway, which was originally built to accommodate a bus rapid transit line that never operated.

In 1991, the Port of Portland adopted a multi-phased, $300 million airport master plan to address expected passenger traffic growth through 2010. The plan upgraded the main passenger terminal building and provisioned for a future light rail station outside the terminal's arrivals hall. By 1994, travelers using the airport had risen by 34 percent, far exceeding the Port's projections. Struggling to meet demand, Port officials moved to accelerate airport light rail plans, which regional planners did not anticipate pursuing until the late 2000s. TriMet had also wanted to prioritize completing the Westside MAX and South/North Corridor projects before extending MAX to the airport.

In 1996, engineering firm Bechtel approached the Port with an unsolicited proposal to build the airport line. After negotiations between Bechtel, the Port, and local jurisdictions, Bechtel was granted the design–build contract for the light rail extension in exchange for development rights to the 120 acre Portland International Center, the largest commercially zoned property in Portland at the time. Bechtel later developed this property and renamed it Cascade Station. The Port projected the airport terminal station to cost $8.4 million and allocated a $3 ticket fee to fund its construction. Delta Airlines, Reno Air, and United Airlines protested the use of ticket fees but the Federal Aviation Administration authorized it in May 1999. Construction of the Airport MAX extension commenced the following month. Hoffman Construction began building the station's platform in July 2000 and by August, Stacy and Witbeck had started to lay the 3000 ft of rail along the segment closest to the terminal.

On September 10, 2001, the station opened along with the entire Airport MAX extension that introduced Red Line service between downtown Portland and the airport. Celebrations planned for the following weekend were canceled following the September 11 attacks, and the airport was closed for three days. Planners projected single-car trains to initially serve Portland International Airport station but TriMet deployed two-car consists on the line after recording 3,800 riders over Thanksgiving weekend in November 2001. In September 2003, TriMet extended Red Line service farther west using the existing Westside MAX tracks to Beaverton Transit Center. This was done in an effort to provide a one-seat ride to the airport for westside riders. In 2006, the station handled more than one million passengers in a single year for the first time.

TriMet had reintroduced bus service to the airport with the 272–PDX Night Bus route on September 2, 2018. The bus route ran in the late night and early morning hours when the Red Line was not operating. It was indefinitely suspended on April 5, 2020, amid the COVID-19 pandemic.

2023 reconstruction
On June 18, 2023, TriMet temporarily ceased MAX Red Line service from Portland Airport station to Gateway Transit Center to make way for reconstruction. The newly renovated Portland Airport station opened on October 22, 2023.

Station details
Portland Airport station's platform is situated at ground level just outside the main passenger terminal, near the southernmost entrance, and within 150 ft of the baggage claim area. Prior to the 2023 renovation, it featured a wedge-shaped island platform and a glass canopy designed by ZGF Architects. The rebuilt platform is rectangular. An 80-seat station lobby is located inside the terminal and has ticket vending machines and real-time displays showing train departure times. Prior to the 2023 renovation, the station occupied the end of a single-track section of the Airport MAX segment; the only other such section on the MAX system was the Red Line's merge with the Blue and Green Lines at Gateway/Northeast 99th Avenue Transit Center. The Gateway segment was upgraded to double track in 2024 with the construction of a new platform north of the original station to serve inbound trains.

Public art
Public art pieces commissioned for the Airport MAX Project have a common theme of "flight". The station houses one art installation as part of TriMet's Public Art Program, which is funded at 1.5 percent of a project's total cost. Time Flies by Christine Bourdette is a large, porcelain enamel mural that is displayed on a wall between the station platform and the baggage claim area. The work is described as "a sequence of images related to time and motion". Bourdette also installed bronze rails that lead passengers from the escalators to the platform and blue chevrons on the platform pavement to depict movement.

Services
Portland International Airport station is served by TriMet's MAX Red Line, which connects the airport to Northeast Portland, Portland City Center, and central Beaverton. In spring 2023, the station recorded an average of 1,705 boardings on weekdays. The day's first train arrives from Beaverton Transit Center. The last three westbound trips travel eastbound to Ruby Junction/East 197th Avenue station as through services of the Blue Line. Headway between trains varies from 15 minutes for most of the day to 30 minutes during the early mornings and late evenings. Services operate on all days of the week and are the most frequent on weekdays. Trains from the station take approximately 40 minutes to reach Pioneer Square in downtown Portland—where transfers to all lines are available—and approximately 65 minutes to reach the other end of the line at Beaverton Transit Center.