Wasn’t the use of an X an artifact of the standardization of airport codes into three letters? With airports already having two letter-codes appending an X to meet the new standard.
Not sure what the “= =“ means, but PDX is the airport identifier for Portland. Portland is just “Portland international”. Sometimes the identifiers align closely with airport location or history, like ORD (Chicago) was built on “Orchard Place”, and Douglas manufactured aircraft at a facility there during WW2, so Orchard Douglas became ORD. Someplace like DFW is just Dallas + Fort Worth.
“==“ is either math for constantly equal (there are no situations in which they are different) or programming for boolean equal, aka the question of are these two things equal.
Moreover, in programming a single = sets the value on the left to the value on the right, while == (or in some languages ===) means to compare the values (and === is explicit).
Then there are the various forms of not equal (!=) and greater than/less than or equal ( <=, >= )
LAA and LAI are currently taken by two other airports. Here’s what I could find:
You may wonder where the “X” comes from in the codes for Los Angeles International Airport (LAX), Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport (PHX) and Portland International Airport (PDX). The Phoenix code finishing with an “X” seems logical, but the other airport codes seem pretty random.
In fact, the “X” for LAX and PDX is merely an arbitrary placeholder, created by IATA in the 1940s when airport codes in the U.S. expanded from two to three letters.
At the time, airports used the National Weather Service codes for cities — in this case, with the logical “LA” and “PD” designations. As the number of airports rapidly increased in the 1940s, IATA had to add an extra letter to existing airport codes to make room for new codes.
For the sake of simplicity and not to confuse pilots or passengers with new letter combinations, IATA added an “X” to the end of the existing codes for Los Angeles, Phoenix, Portland and a number of smaller airports. And that’s the way it remains today.
The ICAO designator for all airports in the contiguous US starts with K, so it’s full designator is KLAX. Same for KPDX.
There are over 5,000 public use airports in the US. While not all of them start with K (some very small airports start with a number instead), all moderately sized or larger airports do.
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Just a reminder who this is
Was wondering why they were getting downvoted for asking that question.
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The funniest part is that there’s only like 7 users. A real losers club.
It’s the airport code. City starts with P, ends with D, X is just there if they build more airports in the future.
Wasn’t the use of an X an artifact of the standardization of airport codes into three letters? With airports already having two letter-codes appending an X to meet the new standard.
yeah same as LAX
Not sure what the “= =“ means, but PDX is the airport identifier for Portland. Portland is just “Portland international”. Sometimes the identifiers align closely with airport location or history, like ORD (Chicago) was built on “Orchard Place”, and Douglas manufactured aircraft at a facility there during WW2, so Orchard Douglas became ORD. Someplace like DFW is just Dallas + Fort Worth.
Prob more than you wanted, but there you go.
Math nerd to the rescue!
“==“ is either math for constantly equal (there are no situations in which they are different) or programming for boolean equal, aka the question of are these two things equal.
TIL! Thank you.
Moreover, in programming a single = sets the value on the left to the value on the right, while == (or in some languages ===) means to compare the values (and === is explicit).
Then there are the various forms of not equal (!=) and greater than/less than or equal ( <=, >= )
Airport abbreviation probably
Speaking of which, why is Los Angeles International Airport LAX, and not LAI or LAA?
LAA and LAI are currently taken by two other airports. Here’s what I could find:
You may wonder where the “X” comes from in the codes for Los Angeles International Airport (LAX), Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport (PHX) and Portland International Airport (PDX). The Phoenix code finishing with an “X” seems logical, but the other airport codes seem pretty random.
In fact, the “X” for LAX and PDX is merely an arbitrary placeholder, created by IATA in the 1940s when airport codes in the U.S. expanded from two to three letters.
At the time, airports used the National Weather Service codes for cities — in this case, with the logical “LA” and “PD” designations. As the number of airports rapidly increased in the 1940s, IATA had to add an extra letter to existing airport codes to make room for new codes.
For the sake of simplicity and not to confuse pilots or passengers with new letter combinations, IATA added an “X” to the end of the existing codes for Los Angeles, Phoenix, Portland and a number of smaller airports. And that’s the way it remains today.
X means international I think
X is from when airport codes were two letters.
The ICAO designator for all airports in the contiguous US starts with K, so it’s full designator is KLAX. Same for KPDX.
There are over 5,000 public use airports in the US. While not all of them start with K (some very small airports start with a number instead), all moderately sized or larger airports do.
I’m gonna start calling Chicago ORD from now on.
Disappointed the Midway code is MDW so you can’t call Chicago MID.
But it’s quintessential MIDwest
No it isn’t. The quintessential Midwest is an eternal battle between Chicago and Des Moines. Between great lakes and great plains.
It was ORD because the original was Orchard Place
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