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BILL CATLIN: The actual construction of a new airport takes several years, but making the decision to build is a process that generally takes over a decade. Denver hopes to begin construction next July. The city has gotten that far because of several major problems which evolved over the last 15 years, problems that may surface in the Twin Cities, but which do not exist here yet. In Denver, the primary factor was congestion.

SPEAKER: We'll be in this holding pattern for 12 minutes [INAUDIBLE] expect further--

BILL CATLIN: Denver Stapleton Airport is notorious for delays. Two major airlines, Continental and United, use Denver as a hub. 32 million passengers come through this terminal each year. This is one of the busiest airports in the nation, much busier than the Twin Cities.

But Stapleton is hobbled by its runways. They're too close together, and during bad flying weather, one has to close. The problem has made Stapleton the bottleneck of the entire nation's air transportation system, fouling up schedules around the country.

The delays peaked several years ago. When asked how bad they got, Denver officials don't talk about statistics. They talk about image, a bad image.

TOM GOUGEON: The easiest way to demonstrate it are the ads that Western Airlines ran full-page ads in the Wall Street Journal and New York Times and elsewhere.

BILL CATLIN: Tom Gougeon is administrative assistant to Mayor Federico Peña.

TOM GOUGEON: It was like a New Yorker cartoon that showed a guy coming into a business meeting obviously late with his luggage under his arm, saying, sorry, I'm late. I had to fly through Stapleton. I mean, that says it all. That was our problem, that we were developing a national reputation as being a place to avoid, and it was getting worse. It didn't look like we were on the way to solving that in any respect.

SKIP SPENSLEY: If you're interested in providing a future for your children and the people who live here, transportation is an absolute essential element of that.

BILL CATLIN: Skip Spensley is a city consultant who managed the early stages of the new Denver Airport project.

SKIP SPENSLEY: We are not on a river. We're not on an ocean. We have to rely on our airport as our port to the rest of the world.

BILL CATLIN: In the early 1970s, Stapleton became increasingly congested, but there was no room to add runways. Also, opposition to airport noise from nearby neighborhoods was growing more and more bitter. The city began to debate building a new airport in a new location, but political egos were involved, says Spensley, especially that of former Denver Mayor Bill McNichols.

SKIP SPENSLEY: The airport was his baby, and nobody was going to tell him where to put an airport. I remember Steve Cramer, who was the County commissioner in Adams County and chairman of the commission, said one day that he had asked Bill McNichols to sit down and talk with him about the siting of the airport, and there were about four words spoken.

Bill said, we're going to keep the airport where it is. What would you like to have for breakfast? And that was the end of the conversation.

BILL CATLIN: In 1983, the Denver Regional Council of Governments said Stapleton should be expanded, with a new runway built on the nearby Rocky Mountain arsenal. But the airport is run by the mayor's office. The day the council voted, Mayor Federico Peña had been in office 19 days.

FEDERICO PEÑA: When I took office in '83, I initially said that was the right approach to take. And then I recognized some very simple facts. Number one, the Rocky Mountain arsenal was and is the most contaminated piece of land in America. That it would probably take decades to decontaminate and billions of dollars, and that was really not a likely solution.

BILL CATLIN: Also, residents near the arsenal vowed to fight the new runway tooth and nail. And aide Tom Gougeon says it became clear that one new runway on the arsenal wouldn't be enough over the long term, so the new mayor began to lean towards a new airport. Denver officials began negotiations with representatives of Adams County just to the North.

After several years, they agreed on a new site and on a list of conditions to protect Adams County from noise and other problems caused by the new airport. Last spring, Adams County voters narrowly voted to give Denver more than 50 square miles of desert farmland and residential developments for a new airport. It was the culmination of a bitter campaign.

JIM NELMS: Where we're standing now is in Denver, Colorado, not in Adams County, Colorado any longer.

BILL CATLIN: Jim Nelms is standing where the new terminal is supposed to be built. He's surrounded by rolling fields of wheat stubble, a few oil wells, and the Rocky Mountains. Nelms led the opposition from his position on the city council of Brighton, the Adams County seat.

He and other opponents pulled a variety of arrows from their political quiver, including noise, traffic problems, neighborhood buyouts, even giving away land to Denver, which tends to dump its problems in Adams County. The opposition was outspent 11 to 1, but Nelms says the bust in the region's important oil economy made the battle even harder.

JIM NELMS: People in Denver were fairly desperate for jobs out here, and we need a construction project in the worst way to get jobs stimulated. And so basically, people aren't interested in that, and they're interested more obviously in a public works project than they were in an airport.

BILL CATLIN: This is Downtown Denver, where free buses start their run down the 16th Street Mall. During lunchtime, the mall appears to be thriving. But the last few years have seen tough economic times, both in the city and the state, something people here aren't used to.

As oil prices drop, unemployment rose. Mayor Federico Peña says the economy gave supporters of the airport the selling point they needed to convince Adams County residents to vote in favor of the new airport.

FEDERICO PEÑA: New jobs, new businesses, economic impact, which they have been wanting for years. And were it not, I think, for a difficult economic climate, I think that election would have been much closer and probably would have lost.

BILL CATLIN: In pushing for a new airport, public officials had promised major economic benefits, an end to the noise problem, and a convenient new airport paid for by the airlines that would use it. Not surprisingly, opposition remains. Ruben Espinoza is a Denver neighborhood activist.

RUBEN ESPINOZA: Governor Roy Romer is on record as having stated several times that if we don't build the airport, Colorado will die. Roy Romer is all smoke and no fire.

BILL CATLIN: Espinoza says the airport won't create any economic benefits on its own, but merely facilitate growth. Similar objections have been raised by the airlines. Airlines generally pay the cost of a new airport through landing fees and rent. Financing a huge new project usually requires the airlines backing.

Continental and United initially supported the new Denver Airport but later changed their minds. Traffic in Denver has declined for over a year, and the airlines say a new airport isn't needed until the next century. They also say the city has underestimated the cost by at least $1 billion.

Last month, Continental issued an ultimatum. Ned Walker is a spokesman in Houston.

NED WALKER: If the city can go ahead and commit to the price that it says it will cost per passenger and guarantee that, we will go ahead and move full speed ahead with the city and county to get the airport done. But we have to have that guaranteed.

BILL CATLIN: Mayor Peña is considering the offer. He maintains the airlines have been balking for fear of new competition in a bigger facility. The mayor maintains he doesn't need the airline support. He says the airport can be built at the projected price, with financing based on the inherent strength of the Denver travel market and with half a billion dollars in federal grants.

The grants have not been approved, though, and skeptics fear taxpayers will wind up with the bill at a time when the region's economy is faltering. Also pending is federal approval of the critical environmental impact statement. Nonetheless, Denver hopes to begin construction next summer. Land has already been bought and residents relocated.

Will Denver actually do what some say is the impossible? Skip Spensley, who got the project underway in the mid '80s, believes if the airport reaches the halfway point, its success is guaranteed. He recalls a story about Robert Moses, New York's famous public works official. Moses wanted to build a $50 million highway project but got only $5 million from the legislature.

SKIP SPENSLEY: And he went out there with that $5 million. He tore up every roadway system he could find that might connect to the new parkway. And when he ran out of money, he created such a public furor, the legislature gave him the rest of the money. I think that if we found ourselves in a situation where we only had half the financing to build the airport, if we got halfway done, I think we would find the other half.

I think people would say this is too important to the future of Colorado, in fact, to the future of our national air transportation system to let Denver fail at this.

BILL CATLIN: Skip Spensley. In the Twin Cities, the demand for air travel is projected to grow to the point that delays and congestion could become a major problem here. Officials say a new airport will become a reality only when there is a serious problem and expansion of the current airport is ruled out. Tomorrow, the debate over when to move to a new Twin Cities airport. This is Bill Catlin reporting.