Update 6/14/22: Lounge will reopen on 6 a.m. local time on Wednesday, June 15
Update 6/8/21: Lounge now closed again until later this year due to building repairs.
Update 3/9/20: Lounge now open, more information here.
Update 3/6/20: Lounge is set to open this coming Monday (3/9/20)
Update: Some additional details about the lounge are found in a recent LAWA public agenda (found here). Thanks to reader Richard.
- Estimated premise size: 13,693 square feet
- Minimum lounge capital investment: $5,576,800
- They also talk about the fact that this lounge space has been vacant for some time and they’ve attempted to lease it out to airlines without success.
This would make it one of the larger lounges,although still 1,300 square feet smaller than the JFK lounge. It will be interesting to see how it copes with the number of cardholders that will want to access it.
Hot on the announcement of a new centurion lounge being built at DEN is the news that American Express will be building another centurion lounge at Los Angeles International Airport in the Tom Bradley international terminal. This tweet provides some additional details:
As you see rent isn’t cheap for these lounges, American Express will pay $33,400,000 over ten years and that doesn’t include fitting the lounge out or ongoing expenses. Here’s what else we know:
- Tom Bradley International Terminal (TBIT) is connect airside to terminal T4-T7. The walk to these terminals isn’t a short one unfortunately. You can also get a Delta bus from terminal 2 & 3. That would leave only terminal 1 truly stranded.
- Lounge should open in the first half of 2019
Previously American Express has had pop up lounges at LAX, but never anything permanent and calling the pop ups a lounge is being extremely generous. American Express already has lounges in Dallas, Hong Kong, Houston, Las Vegas, New York (LGA), Philadelphia, Miami, Seattle & San Francisco. They also have lounges planned for Denver and New York (and now Los Angeles).
The real question is going to be how big is the lounge? Overcrowding is already an issue at some lounges and unless this lounge is massive it’s immediately going to be an issue here as well.
View Comments (37)
The lounge was open a couple weeks ago on May 29th when my wife and I stopped by to get a grab and go. Nope, whole thing buffet and all was open to guest. It was great.
That was a temporary lounge space that Amex set up, not the real thing.
Any data points on the reopening of this Amex LAX lounge? Had planned a family wedding trip to connect in LAX just for this lounge end of this month. I'm surprised its closed this long for "repairs". If they're gonna keep raising the annual fee, Amex need to at least keep these lounges in bigger markets operable for their loyal paying members!
I feel like there are more closed Centurion lounges than opened ones.
I went here in late May. Checked in and they gave me a sandwich box, a coffee and then told me that I couldn’t sit inside the lounge.
So it’s basically “here is a sandwich that we got some celebrity chef to authorize and a coffee and get lost”.
it wasn't even a very good sandwich
Bah! Bout the sames at SEA.
𝓞𝓾𝓽𝓻𝓪𝓰𝓮! what's left? 𝙰𝚕𝚊𝚜𝚔𝚊 𝙻𝚘𝚞𝚗𝚐𝚎?
Delta Skyclub in Terminal 2 was still open as of last week.
Thank you so much for your service
Lame. Two connecting flights through LAX this Summer.
Do we know what the spa services are and are they included?
"American Express already has lounges in Dallas, Hong Kong, Houston, Las Vegas, New York (LGA), Philadelphia, Miami, Seattle & San Francisco."
What about Charlotte?
Original post was written before that lounge opened.
Charlotte opened last month!
Praying for Chicago, especially since the city has renegotiated all of the leases with United and American. Even if it comes, we probably won't see anything until 2026.
No kidding on that! Why no love for ORD?
I read in the Tribune that part of the reason is United and American have had major control of ORD since they had a long-term lease in comparison to other major airports. I find it odd that any airline would not want a Centurion, but AA fought hard to keep Amex out of DFW, and thankfully lost. Maybe lounge memberships decline? Yet I would expect more vendors would help lower airport costs overall, or at least the cost per square foot to build and run operations. I guess UA/AA have been fighting hard for more gates at ORD, and maybe in their mind lounge space may take away resources for building those gates.
Anyway, I would just be so thrilled if PriorityPass or Amex worked with some restaurant to offer a little bit of credit or even discounts on restaurants in ORD. Given how stagnant growth has been at ORD, perhaps the leasing rates are quite high for vendors, and thus margins low, yet even MIA has a partnered restaurant.
Time will tell, but I'm sure Amex is interesting in opening a lounge, and targeting the new global terminal will be prime space for them. I don't expect it until 2030 tho... :(
A little bit MEH to be honest... I just went to my first two AMEX lounges last week (LGA and MIA) and they were both pretty basic. They didnt seem any better than admirals club lounges or international PP lounges and they were WAY worse than any LATAM or flagship lounge from american.
I will travel to Asia in business class with Cathay in less than two months? Do you know if I am eligible to come in flagship lounge?