Beginnings President
Franklin D. Roosevelt's administration approved preliminary funds for site development of the Greater Cincinnati Airport on February 11, 1942. This was part of the
United States Army Air Corps program to establish training facilities during
World War II. At the time, air traffic in the area centered on
Lunken Airport just southeast of central Cincinnati. Lunken opened in 1926 in the Ohio River Valley; it frequently experienced fog, and the
1937 flood submerged its runways and two-story terminal building. Federal officials wanted an airfield site that would not be prone to flooding, but Cincinnati officials hoped to build Lunken into the region's main airport. Officials from
Boone,
Kenton, and
Campbell counties in Kentucky took advantage of Cincinnati's short-sightedness and lobbied Congress to build an airfield there. Boone County officials offered a suitable site on the provision that Kenton County paid the acquisition cost. In October 1942, Congress provided $2 million to build four runways. On October 27, 1946, a small wooden terminal building opened and the airport prepared for commercial service under the name
Greater Cincinnati Airport.
Boone County Airlines was the first airline to provide scheduled service from the airport and had its headquarters at the airport. The April 1957 Official Airline Guide shows 97 weekday departures: 37 American, 26 Delta, 24 TWA, 8 Piedmont, and 2 Lake Central. As late as November 1959 the airport had four runways at 45-degree angles, the north–south runway eventually being extended into today's runway 18C/36C. In the 1950s Cincinnati city leaders began pushing for expansion of a site in
Blue Ash to both compete with the Greater Cincinnati Airport and replace Lunken as the city's primary airport. The city purchased Hugh Watson Field in 1955, turning it into
Blue Ash Airport. The city's Blue Ash plans were hampered by community opposition, three failed
Hamilton County bond measures, political infighting, and Cincinnati's decision not to participate in the federal airfield program.
Jet age On December 16, 1960, the jet age arrived in Cincinnati when a Delta Air Lines
Convair 880 from Miami completed the first scheduled jet flight. The airport needed to expand and build more modern terminals and other facilities; the original Terminal A was expanded and renovated. The north–south runway was extended from . In 1964, the board approved a $12 million bond to expand the south concourse of Terminal A by and provide nine gates for
TWA, American, and Delta. In 1988, two founders of Comair, Patrick Sowers and Robert Tranter launched a new scheduled airline from CVG named
Enterprise Airlines, which served 16 cities at its peak. The airline spearheaded the regional jet revolution in a unique manner by operating 10-seat
Cessna Citation business jets in scheduled services. The flights became popular with Cincinnati companies. The airline served destinations including Baltimore, Boston, Cedar Rapids, Columbus (OH), Green Bay, Greensboro, Greenville, Hartford, Memphis, Milwaukee, New York–JFK, and Wilmington (NC). The airline also became the first international feed carrier by feeding the
British Airways Concorde at JFK. In 1991, the airline ceased operations because of high fuel prices and the suspension of the British Airways contract after the first Gulf War.
Delta Air Lines hub heading to Paris in 2015 In the mid-1980s, Delta opened a hub in Cincinnati and constructed Terminals C and D with 22 gates. During the decade, Delta ramped up both mainline and Comair operations and established
Delta Connection. Delta's continued growth at CVG then prompted them to spend $550 million to build their own terminal facility in the 1990s. The new terminal, known then as Terminal 3, opened in 1994 and would largely replace Terminal D. Terminal 3 consisted of three airside concourses, with most of Terminal D's gate space being repurposed into Terminal 3's Concourse A while Concourses B and C were new construction. Concourses A and B were parallel concourses connected to Terminal 3's main building by an underground walkway which also included
a people mover (a similar layout to Delta's main hub at
Hartsfield–Jackson Atlanta International Airport). Concourse C was only accessible by shuttle buses and was a ground-level facility for regional aircraft used by
Delta Connection (operated by
Comair). After the opening of Terminal 3, the former Terminals B and C were renamed Terminals 1 and 2 respectively, which continued to house non-Delta airlines. Aircraft operations dramatically increased from around 300,000 to 500,000 yearly aircraft movements. In turn, passenger volumes doubled within a decade from 10 million to over 20 million. This expansion prompted the building of runway 18L/36R and the airport began making preparations to construct Concourse D while adding an expansion to Concourse A and B. At its peak, CVG became Delta's second largest hub, handling over 600 flights daily in 2005. The hub served everything from a 64-mile flight to Dayton, to a daily nonstop to Honolulu and Anchorage, to transatlantic destinations including Amsterdam, Brussels, Frankfurt, London, Manchester, Munich, Paris, Rome, and Zürich. Additionally,
Air France operated flights into CVG for several periods for over a decade before finally terminating the service in 2007. When Delta went into bankruptcy in September 2005, a large reduction at CVG eliminated most early-morning and night flights. Concourse C, which had opened in 1994 at a cost of $50 million, was permanently closed in 2008 and demolished in 2016, since it was built for smaller regional jets which were going out of fashion, and it was not connected to the people mover system. Further reductions in early 2010 caused Delta to close Concourse A in Terminal 3 on May 1, consolidating all operations into Concourse B. This resulted in the layoff of more than 800 employees. By 2011, Delta was down to roughly 130 flights per day at CVG. After several years of cuts to its older fleet, which were cited as being cut due to high costs associated with rising oil prices, Delta's wholly owned and CVG-based subsidiary,
Comair, ceased all operations in September 2012, ending over three decades of operations. In 2017, the hub was downgraded to a focus city, which was eliminated in 2021.
Recent history Until 2015, CVG consistently ranked among the most expensive major airports in the United States. Delta operated over 75% of flights at CVG, a fact often cited as a reason for relatively high domestic ticket prices. Airline officials suggested that Delta was practicing
predatory pricing to drive away discount airlines. From 1990 to 2003, ten discount airlines began service at CVG, but later pulled out, including
Vanguard Airlines, which pulled out of CVG twice. After
Delta downsized its hub operations, low cost carriers began operations and have been sustained at the airport ever since. Terminal 2 was closed in May 2012, and CVG re-opened and consolidated all non-Delta airlines to Concourse A in Terminal 3 at that time, which became the sole terminal. Renovation and expansion of the ticketing/check-in area and Concourse A took place that year to accommodate the move. Terminals 1 and 2 were torn down in early 2017 to construct an overnight parking and deicing area. Both concourses, the customs facility, baggage claim, and ticketing areas were renovated in late 2017 to mid 2018 under a $4.5 million plan. In 2021, the airport opened a new rental car and ground transportation center adjacent to the main terminal. ==Facilities==