Original site Prior to human development, the coastlines of
Bowery Bay and Flushing Bay converged at a natural
point that comprised the eventual northern shoreline of
Newtown, Queens. By 1858, the area was partially contained by the estate of
Benjamin Pike Jr. based around what is today known as the
Steinway Mansion, which was soon purchased and consolidated with other property by
William Steinway. In June 1886, Steinway opened a summer resort development known as Bowery Bay Beach on the peninsula. Originally featuring a bathing pavilion, beach, lawns, and boathouse, the resort was renamed North Beach and later expanded with the addition of Gala Amusement Park. By the turn of the century, North Beach's German-influenced development drew comparisons to
Brooklyn's Coney Island. Its fortunes soon turned, however, as
Prohibition in the United States and war-related
anti-German sentiment presented significant challenges to the resort's profitability. These factors, combined with increased industrialization and pollution of the Queens waterfront, made the area untenable as a leisure destination, and it was abandoned at some point in the 1920s.
North Beach Airport In April 1929, New York Air Terminals, Inc., announced plans to open a private seaplane base at North Beach later that summer. The facility was christened on June 15 and initially featured a concrete plateau connected to the water by a
amphibious aircraft ramp, with the former resort converted to a passenger terminal. Opening-day festivities for the new airport were attended by a crowd of 5,000, and included
air races with
Curtiss Seagulls and
Sikorsky flying boats, a dedication address by Borough President
George U. Harvey, and the commencement of airline service to
Albany and
Atlantic City by Coastal Airways and
Curtiss Flying Service. One month later, service to
Boston was launched using
Savoia-Marchetti S.55 aircraft operated by Airvia.
Glenn H. Curtiss Airport By 1930, the airport had been improved with
hangars and night-illuminated
runways, and it housed seaplanes of the recently reorganized
New York City Police Department Aviation Unit. On September 23, the site was renamed
Glenn H. Curtiss Airport in honor of the
New York aviation pioneer who had died one month earlier (not to be confused with the pre-existing
Curtiss Field in nearby
Garden City, nor a similarly renamed
airport in Valley Stream). In a ceremony that same day, representatives from the forerunner to
Trans World Airlines announced their bid to establish the nation's first transcontinental
airmail route to the airport using
Ford Trimotors; in attendance were
Eleanor Roosevelt and
Charles Lindbergh. On August 27, 1931, the airport welcomed the arrival of the world's then-largest airplane, the
Dornier Do X, after a 10-month transatlantic journey. Over 18,000 people visited the huge flying boat on its first day of static display, and it remained in the city for nine months. While the Do X was ultimately a commercial failure, its presence demonstrated the viability of long-distance air travel terminating a mere 20-minute drive from Manhattan. Likewise, this centralized location also enabled the airport to host hourly
air taxi services between Newark and Brooklyn's
Floyd Bennett Field that September. While Curtiss Field was quickly becoming a magnet of aviation,
Newark Airport remained the primary terminal for New York City-bound passengers and mail. The city's lack of its own central airport lingered as the 1930s wore on, especially as discussion grew regarding the commercial viability of privately operated fields.
Municipal Airport 2 poster advertising the newly built air terminals of New York City The 1934 election of mayor
Fiorello La Guardia ushered in a new era of public investment in New York City's airports. LaGuardia had been a long-time aviation advocate; in a 1927 editorial penned while serving as a
U.S. representative of New York, he criticized both the federal and state governments' slow progress in establishing municipal airports in the city. Although several potential sites had been identified, LaGuardia mainly pushed for the transformation of
Governors Island into a combined airport and seaplane base. "No greater monument to the life and activity of the Republic can be imagined," he wrote, painting it as a teeming transportation hub at the extreme center of the city. Military and shipping concerns eventually shut down the proposal, but LaGuardia and industry leaders maintained consensus that New York City needed a central "express" airport to complement the farther-flung
Floyd Bennett Field, which it completed in 1930. While the Governors Island proposal was being litigated, LaGuardia also saw development potential in Curtiss Airport. Under his administration, the city entered a five-year contract with its owners, agreeing to lease the field for $1 per year, with an option to purchase the property for $1,500,000 (). The airport was officially dedicated
Municipal Airport 2 on January 5, 1935. At a key ceremony that day, LaGuardia also received a signed lease from
Trans World Airlines (TWA) for hangar space at Floyd Bennett Field—making it the first
major US airline to serve New York City directly. While years would pass before TWA arrived at North Beach, LaGuardia had begun fulfilling one of his ultimate goals - extracting New York City from "the humiliating position of seeing all its passengers and mail traffic go to a nearby state." American Airlines accepted LaGuardia's offer to start a trial program of scheduled flights to Floyd Bennett, although the program failed after several months because Newark's airport was closer to
Manhattan. La Guardia went as far as to offer police escorts to airport limousines in an attempt to get American Airlines to continue operating the trial program. During the Floyd Bennett experiment, LaGuardia and American executives began an alternative plan to build a new airport in Queens, where it could take advantage of the new
Queens–Midtown Tunnel to Manhattan. The existing North Beach Airport was an obvious location, but much too small for the sort of airport that was being planned. With backing and assistance from the
Works Progress Administration, construction began in 1937, it is on the waterfront of Flushing and Bowery Bays in East Elmhurst, and borders the neighborhoods of
Astoria and
Jackson Heights. Building on the site required moving landfill from
Rikers Island, then a garbage dump, onto a metal reinforcing framework. The framework below the airport still causes magnetic interference on the compasses of outgoing aircraft; signs on the airfield warn pilots about the problem. Because of American's pivotal role in the development of the airport, LaGuardia gave the airline extra real estate during the airport's first year of operation, including four hangars, which was an unprecedented amount of space at the time. American opened its first
Admirals Club (and the first private airline club in the world) at the airport in 1939. The club took over a large office space that had previously been reserved for the mayor, but he offered it for lease following criticism from the press, and American vice president Red Mosier immediately accepted the offer. at LaGuardia, 1960 The airport was dedicated on October 15, 1939, as the New York Municipal Airport, and opened for business on December 2 of that year. Newark Airport began renovations, but could not keep up with the new Queens airport, which
TIME called "the most pretentious land and seaplane base in the world". Even before the project was completed, LaGuardia had won commitments from the five largest airlines (
Pan American Airways, American,
United,
Eastern Air Lines, and
Transcontinental and Western Air) to begin using the new field as soon as it opened. Pan Am's transatlantic
Boeing 314 flying boats moved to La Guardia from
Port Washington in 1940. During World War II, the airport was used to train aviation technicians and as a logistics field. Transatlantic landplane airline flights started in late 1945; some continued after
Idlewild (now John F. Kennedy International) opened in July 1948, but the last ones shifted to Idlewild in April 1951. Newspaper accounts alternately referred to the airfield as New York Municipal Airport and LaGuardia Field until the modern name was officially applied when the airport moved to
Port of New York Authority control under a lease with New York City on June 1, 1947. LaGuardia opened with four runways at 45°-degree angles to each other, the longest (13/31) being . Runway 18/36 was closed soon after a United DC-4 ran off the south end in 1947; runway 9/27 (4,500 ft) was closed around 1958, allowing LaGuardia's terminal to expand northward after 1960. Around 1961, runway 13/31 was shifted northeastward to allow construction of a parallel taxiway (such amenities being unknown when LGA was built), and in 1965–66, both remaining runways were extended to their present . The April 1957
Official Airline Guide shows 283 weekday fixed-wing departures from LaGuardia: 126 American, 49 Eastern, 33 Northeast, 31 TWA, 29 Capital, and 15 United. American's flights included 26 nonstops to Boston and 27 to Washington National (mostly
Convair 240s). Jet flights (United 727s to Cleveland and Chicago) started on June 1, 1964. Although LaGuardia was a large airport for the era in which it was built, it soon became too small. Starting in 1968,
general-aviation aircraft were charged heavy fees to operate from LaGuardia during peak hours, driving many LGA operators to airports such as
Teterboro Airport in
Teterboro, New Jersey. The increase in traffic at LaGuardia and safety concerns prompted the closure of nearby
Flushing Airport in 1984. Also in 1984, to further combat overcrowding at LGA, the Port Authority instituted a Sunday-thru-Friday "perimeter rule" banning nonstop flights from LaGuardia to cities more than away; at the time, Denver was the only such city with nonstop flights, and it became the only exception to the rule. (In 1986,
Western Airlines hoped to fly 737-300s nonstop to
Salt Lake City, and unsuccessfully challenged the rule in federal court.) Later, the Port Authority also moved to connect JFK and Newark Airport to regional rail networks with the
AirTrain Newark and
AirTrain JFK, in an attempt to make these more distant airports competitive with LaGuardia. In addition to these local regulations, the
Federal Aviation Administration also limited the number of flights and types of aircraft that could operate at LaGuardia. LaGuardia's traffic continued to grow. By 2000, the airport routinely experienced overcrowding delays, many more than an hour long. That year,
Congress passed legislation to revoke the federal traffic limits on LaGuardia by 2007. The reduced demand for air travel following the
September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on New York City quickly slowed LaGuardia's traffic growth, helping to mitigate the airport's delays. Ongoing Port Authority investments to renovate the Central Terminal Building and improve the airfield layout have also made the airport's operations more efficient in recent years. The FAA approved instrument departure procedure "Whitestone Climb" and the "Expressway Visual Approach to Runway 31". When adopting the Expressway Approach, when the aircraft crosses the intersection of the
Brooklyn Queens Expressway and the
Long Island Expressway in Long Island City, it turns northeast on 85° and follows the Long Island Expressway, after reaching
Flushing Meadow Park, the aircraft executes a 135° left turn over the Flushing Bay and joins the final approach to the runway 31. When adopting Whitestone Climb, aircraft circle over Flushing and head to
Whitestone Bridge on the north upon takeoff from runway 13. Such patterns aim to reduce the noise, avoid the traffic of the JFK Airport, and maximize the air-traffic capacity in the
New York TRACON. LGA and JFK approach airspaces borders around the
Belmont Park. In late 2006, construction began to replace the
Wallace Harrison-designed air traffic control tower built in 1962 with a more modern one. The tower began operations on October 9, 2010. A replica of the 1962 control tower was installed in a decorative garden at the airport in 2025, to preserve the memory of its unique design. On August 12, 2009, Delta Air Lines and US Airways announced a
landing slot and terminal swap in separate press releases. Under the swap plan, US Airways would have given Delta 125 operating slot pairs at LaGuardia. US Airways, in return, would have received 42 operating slot pairs at
Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport in
Crystal City, Virginia, and be granted the authority to begin service from the US to
São Paulo, Brazil, and
Tokyo, Japan. When the swap plan was complete, Delta Shuttle operations would have moved from the Marine Air Terminal to Terminal C (the present US Airways terminal), and Terminals C and D would have been connected together. US Airways Shuttle flights would have moved to the Marine Air Terminal, and mainline US Airways flights would have moved to Terminal D (the present Delta terminal). The deal would allow Delta to create a domestic hub at LaGuardia. The
United States Department of Transportation announced that it would approve the Delta–US Airways transaction under the condition that they sell slots to other airlines. Delta and US Airways dropped the slot swap deal in early July 2010, and both airlines filed a court appeal. In May 2011, both airlines announced that they would resubmit their proposal of the slot swap to the US DOT. It was tentatively approved by the US DOT on July 21, 2011. The slot swap received final approval from the US DOT on October 10, 2011. On December 16, 2011, Delta Air Lines announced plans to open a new domestic hub at LaGuardia Airport. The investment was the largest single expansion by any carrier at LaGuardia in decades, with flights increasing by more than 60%, and destinations by more than 75%. By summer 2013, Delta increased operations to 264 daily flights between LaGuardia and more than 60 cities, more than any other airline at LaGuardia. In November 2019, Southwest Airlines ended service to Newark, primarily due to the
Boeing 737 MAX groundings, poor performance, and inadequate facilities, and consolidated its New York–area operations to LaGuardia and Islip.
Redevelopment In April 2010, Port Authority director Christopher Ward announced that the agency had hired consultants to explore a full demolition and rebuilding of LaGuardia's Central Terminal. The project would create a unified, modern, and efficient plan for the airport, currently an amalgam of decades of additions and modifications. The project, expected to cost $2.4 billion, was to include the demolition of the existing central terminal building and its four concourses, garage, hangar 1, and frontage roads; building temporary facilities, and designing and building a new central terminal building. The rebuilding would be staged in phases in order to maintain operations throughout the project. Proposals were due on January 31, 2012. Patrick Foye, executive director of the Port Authority, said, "It's got a quaint, nostalgic but unacceptable kind of the 1940s, 1950s feel that's just not acceptable." The Port Authority was seeking a private company to develop and operate the replacement terminal with private funds, similar to how Delta operates the other terminals at the airport. However, in January 2014, Governor
Andrew Cuomo announced a plan for the state to oversee the construction of the long-stalled new terminal project instead of the proposed public-private partnership. On July 27, 2015, Governor Cuomo, joined by then-Vice President
Joe Biden, announced a $4 billion plan to rebuild the terminals as one contiguous building with terminal bridges connecting buildings. Airport officials and planners had concluded that the airport essentially had to be torn down and rebuilt. Under the airport redevelopment plan disclosed in 2015, a single terminal building was to be constructed in stages, with a
people mover, retail space, and a new hotel. Some of additional
taxiways were to be built, and the
Grand Central Parkway was to be reconfigured. A proposed high-speed ferry, if introduced, was to service the
Marine Air Terminal, a national historic landmark, which will remain intact. An onsite tram had also been proposed to move passengers more quickly within the central terminal. The new airport is to be eco-friendly and contain accommodations such as a hotel of approximately 200 rooms The entire airport will move closer to the Grand Central Parkway. New parking garages replaced parking facilities between the existing terminals and Grand Central Parkway, creating space for the new facilities. By locating the terminals closer to the Grand Central Parkway, additional space for aircraft taxiways and hold areas was created, reducing ground delays. The runways themselves were not reconfigured. Construction of the project's first phase started in spring of 2016, once final plans were approved by the Port Authority board, with the entire redevelopment scheduled to be completed by late 2022. Terminal B would be demolished, and Delta would rebuild its terminals C and D in coordination with the plan. The new airport was to feature an island gate system, with passengers connecting between the terminal building and the gates via bridges that would be high enough for aircraft to taxi under. In late March 2016, the comprehensive plans for the redevelopment were approved unanimously between the Port Authority of New York, New Jersey, and LaGuardia Gateway Partners for the Terminal B Project. Construction costs were estimated to range from $4 billion to $5.3 billion. In August 2017,
Magic Johnson Enterprises and Loop Capital created a joint venture named JLC Capital to invest in Phase 2 of LaGuardia Airport's reconstruction. The same month, Delta broke ground on the last phase of the airport's reconstruction. On December 9, 2017, six airlines moved at LGA in anticipation of the new terminals.
Alaska Airlines (originally
Virgin America) and
JetBlue moved to the Marine Air Terminal.
American consolidated in Terminal B.
Frontier and
Spirit depart from Terminal C and arrive at Terminal D. Since the move, there have been further changes with
Alaska Airlines ending service to LaGuardia,
JetBlue moving to Terminal B, and
Spirit consolidating its operations in Terminal A. LaGuardia Gateway Partners, which manages the construction of Terminal B, has completed most of the complex. The first half of the seven-level West Parking Garage opened in February 2018, with 1,600 of 3,100 parking spaces being made available, and the rest of the garage was opened later that year. The new space included a concourse with a ceiling, food concessions, an
FAO Schwarz toy store, and an indoor play area. The second bridge connecting to Terminal B was later completed and opened to the public on January 27, 2022. The first concourse to open was Concourse G on the eastern end of the airport, which opened on October 29, 2019. Delta Shuttle flights moved to the Concourse G on November 16, 2019. On June 4, 2022, Delta unveiled its new Terminal C headhouse to the public in tandem with concourse E, which boasts 10 narrow body gates. The Terminal C headhouse consolidates the former Terminal C and D's security checkpoint into 11 lanes, which if necessary, can be expanded to 16 lanes. Other features include a dedicated drop-off area for carry-on-only passengers, biometric scanning technology, a sensory room designed for those with autism, and Delta's largest Sky Club to date. As of June 2022, Delta was in the process of replacing Terminal D's gates and would start construction of Concourse D. Delta is fast-tracking its remaining projects at Terminal C due to the impacts from the
COVID-19 pandemic, which allowed the airline to use the decrease in passage traffic to speed up construction by two years. In March 2024, LaGuardia won the
Airport Service Quality Award for "best airport of 25 to 40 million passengers in North America" in 2023. investigating the aftermath of the collision, March 23, 2026 On March 22, 2026,
Air Canada Express Flight 8646 collided with a firetruck at Runway 4/22. Both pilots died and 42 passengers were injured. A flight attendant had also been ejected from her seat while still buckled in. By March 23, the airport was closed off while agents were investigating and probing the incident, and 72 out of the passengers, about 4 crew members boarded, and 41 people were hospitalizated. The airport remained closed for most of March 23 until progressively reopening later that day. At 3:00 am ET on May 2, 2026,
Spirit Airlines ceased operations following its
Chapter 7 bankruptcy filing. The airline’s last ever take-off from LaGuardia was NK1443 to
Charlotte at 9:51 pm ET on May 1, 2026, while its last ever landing was NK1629 from
Detroit at 11:08 pm ET that same day. ==Operations==