[Updated to include comments from Nov. 15, 2023, Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority board of directors meeting.]
The 2024 budget of the Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority (MWAA) is expected to result in the authority’s lowest cost-per-enplanement at Washington Dulles International Airport since 2008 and the lowest at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport since 1997.
The package was supported at the committee level on Nov. 15 and is slated for consideration by the body’s board of directors in December. The staff proposal calls for a 2024 budget of $810.6 million, up from $754.7 million budgeted this year, addressing both airport operations and debt service.
That package includes $199.4 million for operation of Dulles, $112.2 million for operations at National, $128 million for consolidated operations and $68 million for public safety. The number of employees will remain essentially unchanged at 1,810.
Under the proposal, the anticipated cost per enplanement – a common budget metric for analyzing and comparing costs of agencies that operate airports – will decline from $9.90 in 2023 to $9.05 in 2024 at National and from $15.98 to $13.98 at Dulles.
The calculations anticipate a record 25.5 million enplaned passengers in the coming year.
Excepting 2020 and 2021 – when pandemic conditions sent passenger counts plummeting – the highest per-enplanement cost was recorded in 2010 at Reagan National ($13.52) and 2014 at Dulles ($26.56).
Being able to cut the per-enplanement cost is “great news – [it] puts us in a great competitive position,” authority CEO Jack Potter said at the Nov. 15 meeting.
Among potential budget challenges for 2024: Geopolitical unrest; rising oil prices; declining consumer confidence and discretionary income. In addition, federal COVID-relief funding is expected to run out during the year.
In an effort to offset down sides, the airports authority will press for increases in non-airline revenue (parking and concessions) and real-estate development as well as passenger growth at Dulles.
The budget on the airport side is distinct from a separate budget that supports the authority's operation of the Dulles Toll Road. The good news on that front: Given a return to normal(ish) driver counts coupled with a rate hike, revenue on the Toll Road currently is running about 106 percent of pre-pandemic levels.