The 20 million or more passengers traveling through Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport in any given year have James Wilding to thank for the doors still being open.
It was Wilding, among others, who pushed back against efforts by the U.S. Secret Service to shutter the airport permanently in the aftermath of the 9/11 terrorist attacks. That draconian security proposal came close to success – too close for local business and political leaders – before then-President George W. Bush stepped in and halted it.
Wilding, who from 1979 oversaw the local region’s two commercial airports for the Federal Aviation Administration and from 1987 to 2003 served as first CEO of the Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority, died last month in Cary, N.C. He was 85 years old.
At the March 15 meeting of the Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority, current CEO Jack Potter paid tribute to his predecessor.
Wilding was “highly respected and admired,” Potter said, and was the natural choice when operation (if not ownership) of National and Dulles airports was turned over to the regional body during the Reagan administration.
After the federal government relinquished control, the airports authority was able to sell hundreds of millions of dollars in bonds for improvement projects at both airports, as well as support the Dulles Toll Road and begin what turned out to be the lengthy process of extending Metrorail service to Dulles, which occurred last fall.
Although none of the four aircraft hijacked on Sept. 11, 2001, had originated at National, the airport’s proximity to the Pentagon, White House and U.S. Capitol led some in national-security leaders to want it closed and traffic removed to Dulles.
Wilding disagreed, and “his credibility made a difference,” Potter said.
While not being the single factor for the airport’s reopening, Wilding was “a driving force behind Reagan National being open for business today,” he said.
Another piece of the puzzle: Then-U.S. Rep. Jim Moran, D-8th, whose district included the airport, successfully bluffed the Bush administration into thinking he had obtained support from a majority of his congressional colleagues to insist upon reopening the airport after the attacks. Local, regional, state and business leaders also weighed in to keep the facility operating.
In the end, Bush swung around to overrule the security personnel. “There really is no greater symbol that America’s back in business than the reopening of this airport,” he said in announcing his decision.
Reagan National on Oct. 2, 2001, was the last major U.S. airport to reopen after the terrorist incidents, and travelers using it during those days will recall the exceptionally stringent security requirements.
Wilding began working for the Federal Aviation Administration in the late 1950s, starting in a role that worked on planning and constructing Dulles. To honor his leadership, the airports authority in 2016 named the international-arrivals hall at Dulles in his honor.
