What JFK’s colossal $19 billion redevelopment means for the future of U.S. airports

The Air Current
Will Guisbond
20 May 2025

Investors and partners want JFK’s public-private partnership model to be a blueprint for future airport financing

The $19 billion being used to rebuild New York’s John F. Kennedy International Airport (JFK) has the potential to dramatically reshape how the redevelopment of all airports in the United States is paid for, but only if the project’s sponsors can prove that its private equity investment model has broader appeal.

JFK’s complex redevelopment plans cover four of its five terminals, underpinned by a $3.9 billion injection of funding from the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey to upgrade the roadways and power infrastructure common to the entire airport. That public money, when coupled with over $15 billion of private investment, constitutes a public-private partnership (PPP). PPPs are used to combine a mix of public and private funding to complete a project or provide a service that is traditionally delivered exclusively by the public sector.

Read on:  What JFK’s colossal $19 billion redevelopment means for the future of U.S. airports- The Air Current