Picking someone up at the Boise airport? You can wait at new ‘cellphone parking lot’
The Boise Airport will shutter its existing area for people waiting to pick up an arriving passenger, instead sending drivers to a nearby parking lot starting Oct. 15, the city of Boise said in a news release Tuesday.
The city said the current cellphone parking lot — so named because it serves as spot to wait until the driver gets a call or text that a passenger is ready for pickup — has become far too small as the Treasure Valley has grown. The area is a lane on the south side of Airport Way approaching the airport’s arrivals area. It can accommodate around a dozen vehicles.
The new parking lot, at 2950 S. Curtis Road, will have far more capacity and individual stalls, according to the news release. The city said it can accommodate three times as many vehicles and has room to grow.
The downside? It’s much farther away.
The existing waiting area is a few hundred yards from the arrivals area. The new lot, which is at Curtis and Victory Road, is about “a 5- to 7-minute drive” from the terminal, the news release said. The city noted that’s “about the same amount of time it takes a passenger to walk from their gate to the curb for pickup.”
The news release said moving the waiting area will eliminate traffic jams and make arriving at the terminal safer.
The new lot opens Oct. 15. The current waiting area will remain open until the last plane arrives on Oct. 14.
