Building $1 Billion of Runway at CLT International Airport

Disclaimer-this video is NOT produced by CLT.
Welcome to Charlotte Douglas International Airport, one of the busiest in the United States. And like any other busy airport, it's growing FAST.
And fast growth doesn't only mean new airport terminals-it means entirely new runways, like CLT's fourth parallel runway project.
A multi-year $1B undertaking, the fourth parallel runway will eventually allow air traffic to flow in and out of the airport more efficiently.
To build it, there's A LOT of earthmoving involved. And this is where ES Wagner comes into play. Moving dirt since 1947, they also moved the dirt for CLT's third parallel runway in the early 2000s. Now they're back, and we enjoyed checking out the action.
To learn more about ES Wagner, check out their website here: www.eswagner.com/

[@jerrypinnick8309]

Those ejector trucks were something new to see. Nice job.

[@ProudPapaw88]

Another great video, Aaron. Thank you for your hard work in bringing these videos. Always great content and clear videos. Thanks for sharing and have a great weekend.

[@4051a]

Great video. Before I retired, I worked for a contractor that did a lot of work at Chicago's O'Hare field. You video brought back memories.

[@4bfarmsllc262]

Glad you covered the dirt here is temperamental. Most contractors come into town guns a blazing and leave with tail between the legs. Silts and mica make soils light and moisture sensitive. Holland belt loader I saw in person most impressive production I’ve ever seen!

[@AaronWitt]

yeah Wagner's been around the block with this stuff so they have no issue

[@Jhhardwoods]

Just flew in and out of Charlotte last month. That dirt moving operation is huge.

[@dgsantafedave1]

Just got back from Atlanta and wow that airport is huge! Seeing all of this construction going on is awesome! If I was a young person looking for a job that doesn't require a college degree I would learn heavy equipment operations! Also if I was getting a degree I would get a civil engineering degree! Love your show you are going to be busy the next couple of years!

[@AaronWitt]

thank you!

[@m.a.c.8366]

Great info and overview of the project. Night or day, there is never a dull moment building airside civil works.

[@AaronWitt]

thanks for watching

[@m.a.c.8366]

@@AaronWitt Glad to follow, your content is very informative. Many people don't know what goes into building the infrastructure you highlight so well.

[@Rbnqss]

Greetings from Finland, I recently found your channel, very interesting content. Iam big construction equipment fan so nice to see those massive machines.

[@charlesferebee263]

Outstanding Video. ! Keep Up the Great Work. 🇺🇲

[@PA3456]

Great vid as always plenty constraints to deal with.

[@GlobalistJuice]

Massive construction effort! BTW- my Grandfather (Almando Giovanni Luigi Gallucci) and McCourt Construction Company, with whom he worked +45yrs from 1928-ish through the 1970's building the many early roads of Boston Massachusetts (he was always commenting "Wherever Paul Revere road his horse, we built a road. haha!), and constructed runways at Boston's Logan Airport beginning sometime in the 40's(?) (McCourt is still operational and in the business of building airport runways to this day), his crew also erected the "seawall" at Logan Airport, as an effort to prevent ocean water from entering the area... maybe, not sure? (in the 70's a landing plane crashed into that wall because of fog, killing all onboard), and the most notable construction work I am so very proud of my Grandfather is, in the early 1950's he laid the iconic red-bricks for Boston's "Freedom Trail", a sidewalk "trail" leading pedestrians through streets of Historic Boston pinpointing all the famous locations (Paul Revere's house, the Old North Church, Faneuil Hall, the site of the Boston Massacre, etc), he was extremely honored to have been responsible for that project, and the task of keeping the original stones marking the site of the Boston Massacre, safe and in order when they ripped apart the street for paving and then replacing them exactly as were found. He died in 1983 at the age of 74 as a hard working man who loved building roads and most especially, airport runways. He was a wonderful simple family man from Italy, and perfect Grandfather (who loved to tease his grandchildren ha!). Well, that's my longwinded 2-cents about runways.

[@AaronWitt]

amazing thank you for the information

[@billjoat]

Great video AAron. Being in NC myself I especially enjoyed it.

[@floydwilliams3321]

Nice work yall

[@CausticLemons7]

I literally learned the airport code for Charlotte this week, so this is relevant to my interests!

[@paulbush7095]

Does Aaron remind anyone else of Howard Cosell or William Shatner as Capt. Kirk: "He...is....going....to.....go.....all....the....way" or "Mr. Spock.....we...have...to...do...some...thing....about...these...Romulans" His cadence really adds it's own quality to these cool videos

[@pcy113]

"yep ! that's a plane" 9:44 🤣

[@Planeiron]

Great Vid 👍👍👍👍💪🏻💪🏻

[@peterfalconer-h3k]

Great content and a very interesting project overall, the paperwork for crossing an active runway would have cleared a rainforest!

[@rp1645]

Thank you for showing this HUGE dirt moving more runways. 😊on a big USA airport. It just shows how much people use air travel today and how airports need to expand runways 😊 just a question is the big rock native to the airport gound, or was it brought in. Just asking with the soil in one part was big ROCK there also. Its amazing to have them blast so close to active runways 😊 and that the guy running the backhow with sweeper so so important 😊 to think of the walks they do on aircraft carriers that a crew walks the deck looking for any object that might get in fighter jets or cause problems Is there a ( MAT) of some kind at runway crossing under where the big dumps cross ? Again, just what I thought I saw on the runway. You are amazing at all the huge, huge Projects you go to and show all of us watchers that we might NEVER see and to think of the heavy equipment this company must get on job sight to do this huge project. Like you pointing out, you yourself have never SEEN those special made scraper designs

[@COYOTE_N8]

That would be fun job to be on. I love operating heavy equipment. And i love aviation

[@kagisomabuza8669]

literary my favourite channel

[@AaronWitt]

thank you

[@MarkShesrer78]

Brilliant video really enjoying watching it. How do the plane see the construction equipment at night?

[@William-Welch]

Let’s hope they use some funds to improve the terminals and baggage claims which are a complete dump

[@PirateNation2005]

Just flew out of there two weeks ago. My gosh they seem to have made it worse which is saying something as it was bad before.

[@William-Welch]

@@PirateNation2005 doesn’t surprise me at all

[@COYOTE_N8]

Operator input. They are shaking the bucket just to help it a little. You'll start getting build up if the dirt is a little moist so it just helps shake that off.

[@codysp]

It's not dirt, it's soil! 😂

[@aerialbugsmasher]

As a pilot I'm somewhat dreading the extra runway. CLT is one of my most hated airports that I try to avoid like the plague and frankly they need to bulldoze the current terminals and start over, it's the most overcrowded airport, maybe not by numbers of passengers per year compared to others on paper but it really -feels- like it. Throwing more planes into the mix will only make things worse. They should've finished any long-term future master-planned terminal expansions before even bothering with the runways, but I'm just a glorified bus driver so what do I know.

[@LKN117]

Ill be making repairs to a rock drill out there on Monday

[@brandino97yyc]

I got a job at my cities airport and they re building one of our runways it's a pretty crazy project

[@vastylebbq5203]

RG LaTournou would like those wheels wagons.

[@mammoet1133]

Going forward, Aaron and Buildwitt, please try and balance the music with the talking. I'm having to actually consciously screen out the music to hear Aaron talk in the beginning. Thanks.

[@AaronWitt]

we are really trying -- still trying to figure it out

[@daesmith3274]

Hey you ever cover highway work? In idaho we're doing a pretty good sized hwy expansion. My company has been running between 130-150 road going trucks a day. It's a mix of side/belly dumps. Truck an pups, super dumps. Heard our peak recently was about 18,000 tons a day over the interstate.

[@AaronWitt]

man that's awesome

[@Excavator2006malayalam]

I like to see excavator ❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤

[@MartB-tx5lb]

Around 17:30 when the 349 jiggles the bucket back and forth to offload, is that the operator's input or just natural harmonics?

[@AaronWitt]

operator input - trying to carefully get everything into the truck and not on the side boards. Have to keep it clean for the taxiway crossing

[@JoshuaGriffin-e5t]

You should go to rdu where they are building a new runway

[@AaronWitt]

I saw that -- another big one

[@David-od9gb]

@AaronWitt when were you there? I work nearby the airport. WOW that one job sweeping back and forth all day has to be boring but so important nonetheless.

[@AaronWitt]

we were there in December! But the project will be going for a long time

[@UncleManuel]

It's kinda ironic that on an airport it is forbidden that you run on the runway. 😁😜

[@CHRIS-xm1do]

I don’t think those ejector trucks would work here in the UK to many wheels that need maintaining against their load carrying capacity.🚜🚜

[@PirateNation2005]

Love your videos and what you do. So this rant has nothing to do with the awesome work y’all do. 1 Billion for a runway is exactly why DOGE was created. All and all clt got 3.5 Billion for improving the airport is almost theft of the taxpayers. Meck county schools are horrible and crime is rampant. Cost of living is so high now and most of the roads in clt are crap. As someone said before me someone is getting rich off this waste.

[@AaronWitt]

most of the money isn't even federal - most airports are self-sustaining via the fees for airlines / parking / etc. They actually work extremely well financially compared to most other US infrastructure

[@LKN117]

The toll lane and light rail is where your disdain should be directed

[@peterfalconer-h3k]

@@AaronWitt Airports are one of those pieces of infrastructure that no one thinks about and are actually a goldmine for their controlling interests.

[@khubaibahmad2155]

am I too early?

[@lorenzlfk2524]

$20 million for the runway and $980 million in grift.😅

[@vastylebbq5203]

That’s what it takes to get things done. Real world.

[@halimbegovic8231]

Umm not possible to be 4.7 billion for that airports traffic bud... thats global I believe

[@johndiamond9031]

1st!

[@jakeserdar640]

It's amazing that male pilots are able to find the airport 😂

[@Foxtrott_4]

Please try to disable automatic transcription. The AI female voice sounds bloody awful.

[@AaronWitt]

I have no idea what you're talking about but I'll look haha

[@Foxtrott_4]

@@AaronWitt put it in german, it started the video in german for me.

[@aerialbugsmasher]

That's user error. You have to turn it off yourself🙄

[@Foxtrott_4]

@@aerialbugsmasher I have turned it off but i didn't want it in the first place

[@MC-re2ry]

You . . . leave . . . . . BIG . . . . . . . . . pauses . . . . between . . . your . . . words . . . .