Recently, when flying out of the JetBlue terminal at New York’s JFK Airport, we noticed that the numbers of all the gates had changed. Terminal 5 building has 29 gates. Gates 1 through 12 and 14 through 30, with gates 25 through 30 handling international flights. Having spent many hours there over the years, was surprised to see all the gates now have 3 digit numbers. They now number from 501-530, as part of a new numbering scheme to ensure gates at JFK all have unique numbers regardless of terminal.
It turns out, back in the Spring of 2025, overnight, the JetBlue team replaced all signage, giving the old signs to their employees as souvenirs. Terminal 5 was the first terminal to make this change. But unique gate numbers, even if in different terminals does make sense, and placing the first digit at the terminal number makes some sense.
When the renovation at JFK ends, it will have a Terminal 1(replacing the existing Terminal 1 but on the footprint of the old Terminal 2), Terminal 4, Terminal 5, Terminal 6, and Terminal 8. As of now, we have not heard that JFK has opted to renumber the buildings, We still remember a quarter century ago when JFK had 10 terminals. American had Terminals 8 and 9, British Airways had 7, JetBlue had 6 when it first started up, sharing it with United’s LAX and SFO service, 5 was a ghost town after TWA went away, 4 was the International Building, Delta had 2 and 3, and of course, 1 had just recently been built(and is now set for demolition).
On the other side of the country, LAX is doing the same thing…major renovation, but it has opted to renumber the buildings. They are combining Terminals 2 and 3 into a new Terminal 2, the Tom Bradley Terminal or Terminal B will now be the new 3, and 7 and 8 will become…7.
This desire to renumber things extends beyond the airports. Looking at the US highway system, traditionally highways have been numbered sequentially, at least since the Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices mandated exit numbers in 1971(although California was granted a waiver). The Federal Highway Administration has required that all federally funded routes with sequential numbering eventually be converted to mileage-based exit numbers, although no timeframe exists for the conversion.
In the end, coming up with a numbering scheme that is consistent and understandable is an essential for effective navigation, although considering the increased walking time at airports in these newly built terminals, maybe they should be numbered by distance as well.
