West Palm Beach Airport Guide: From PBI to DJT
West Palm Beach Airport, now named for President Trump and coded DJT, serves Florida's Gold Coast. Runways, airlines, routes, access and spotting explained.
By The Aviation Hub
7 min read
Updated October 20, 2026 
West Palm Beach Airport is the northern gateway to Florida’s Gold Coast, sitting just west of the city and across the lagoon from the island of Palm Beach. For most of its life it was Palm Beach International, code PBI. Since July 2026 it has carried the name President Donald J. Trump International Airport and, from August 2026, the new IATA code DJT. Whatever the signage says, the field handles close to nine million passengers a year on heavy seasonal traffic to the northeast United States.
West Palm Beach Airport at a Glance
The airport uses the IATA code DJT, the ICAO code KDJT and the FAA identifier DJT, all changed from PBI in 2026. Many timetables and bag tags still show the old code. The terminal lies about 3 miles (5 km) west of downtown West Palm Beach, between Interstate 95 and Military Trail, with Southern Boulevard along its southern edge. Elevation is 6 metres (19 feet). There are three runways and a single terminal with three concourses and 31 gates.
Traffic reached roughly 8.66 million passengers in 2025 with about 159,000 aircraft operations, a figure swollen by business jets and training flights. No airline calls it a hub. JetBlue and Delta are the largest carriers, each with around a quarter of passengers, followed by American, United and Southwest. Palm Beach County owns and operates West Palm Beach Airport through its Department of Airports. Flight information and parking rates are on the airport’s official website.
How West Palm Beach’s Airport Came to Be
The field opened in 1936 as Morrison Field, named for Grace Morrison, a local woman who helped plan it. Eastern Air Lines flew the first departure, a Douglas DC-2 to New York, and the airport was dedicated on 19 December 1936. The Second World War turned it into an Army Air Forces base that trained crews and staged aircraft for the D Day invasion.
The Air Force handed the field back to Palm Beach County in 1947 and it became Palm Beach International Airport the following year. The military returned during the Korean War, and in the 1950s Palm Beach Air Force Base hosted training units and the hurricane research flights that gave the region its early storm warnings. Civil traffic grew with the Florida boom, and the present terminal opened in 1988 to replace a cramped older building.
A 2006 programme added a seven storey car park and three gates on Concourse C. The runways were renumbered in December 2009 as magnetic variation shifted. Then came the renaming. The Florida Legislature approved the new name in February 2026, Governor DeSantis signed it in March, and it took effect on 9 July 2026. It is the first American airport named for a sitting president.
Runways at West Palm Beach Airport
West Palm Beach Airport has three asphalt runways. The main one is 10L/28R, 3,048 metres (10,001 feet) long and 46 metres wide, which takes all airline traffic and the heaviest business jets. Runway 14/32 crosses it at 2,113 metres (6,931 feet) and serves as the crosswind option and the general aviation strip. The short 10R/28L, just 980 metres (3,214 feet) long and 23 metres wide, is a parallel runway for light aircraft and training flights that keeps them clear of the jets.
Easterly sea breezes dominate for most of the year, so arrivals usually come in over the suburbs to land on runway 10L and depart over the city towards the Atlantic. Winter cold fronts bring westerlies and a switch to the 28s, which sends arrivals over the lagoon and the island of Palm Beach. Noise over the island has long been contentious. Donald Trump sued the county over a runway expansion in 2010 and again over flight paths near his Palm Beach estate in 2015, dropping the second case after the 2016 election. Presidential visits now bring temporary flight restrictions that hamper general aviation across the area.
Terminals and Airlines
The single terminal has a central check in hall and three concourses. Concourse A has four gates and takes the smaller operators, Allegiant Air, Avelo Airlines and Bahamasair. Concourse B has 13 gates and houses American, Southwest, Sun Country, United and some Avelo flights. Concourse C, with 14 gates, is the busiest and serves Air Canada, Breeze Airways, Delta, Frontier, JetBlue and Porter Airlines. Four of the 31 gates are hardstands.
All three alliances are present, with Delta for SkyTeam, United and Air Canada for Star Alliance and American for oneworld. JetBlue and Breeze fit the leisure market that fills the airport from November to April. Lounges are limited to a Delta Sky Club and an independent Primeclass lounge. The general aviation side is enormous, with several fixed base operators handling one of the densest business jet markets in the country.
Routes and Destinations
The West Palm Beach Airport route map is a mirror of where wealthy northeasterners come from. Atlanta is the busiest route with more than 600,000 passengers in 2025, followed by Newark, New York LaGuardia, Charlotte and Boston. New York JFK, Chicago O’Hare, Washington and Philadelphia all have several daily flights in winter. Frequencies on these routes roughly double between Christmas and Easter and shrink again in summer when the snowbirds go home.
International flying is thin. Air Canada and Porter fly from Toronto and Montreal in winter, and Bahamasair hops to Marsh Harbour. The longest routes are the transcontinental services to San Francisco, which United launches in November 2026, and Los Angeles, served seasonally by JetBlue and by Delta from November 2026. Breeze adds Atlantic City in December 2026. Cargo is minor and mostly bellyhold.
Getting to and from West Palm Beach Airport
West Palm Beach Airport has direct ramps from Interstate 95, Southern Boulevard and Congress Avenue. Downtown is ten minutes away by car and Boca Raton about 35 minutes. Fort Lauderdale is an hour south on the interstate. Taxis and ride hailing pick up on the ground floor of the terminal, and a trip downtown costs around 15 US dollars (roughly £12). Rental cars dominate, with a large consolidated facility beside the car park.
Public transport is workable but slow. Palm Tran bus routes 2 and 44 serve the terminal and connect to the West Palm Beach Amtrak and Tri Rail station, which also has Greyhound coaches. Tri Rail commuter trains run south to Fort Lauderdale and Miami. Brightline’s fast trains to Orlando and Miami leave from a station downtown, a short taxi ride away. The cheapest option into town is the Palm Tran bus at a couple of dollars, taking about 20 minutes.
Spotting and Photography
The best known location is the public viewing park on Perimeter Road South, which suits departures from runway 10L, though it was reported closed in 2025. The corner of Tulane Drive and Lindy Lane covers arrivals on runway 10L. The grass beside the Hilton hotel, between Interstate 95 and Australian Avenue, gives arrivals and line ups on 28R when the westerlies blow in winter. The seventh floor of the short term West Palm Beach Airport car park gives a wide view over the aprons and runways.
The southern spots have the sun behind you from late morning to late afternoon in summer and all day in winter. The airline traffic is mostly Airbus A320 family and Boeing 737 types, but the business jet traffic is the draw. Gulfstream G650s, Bombardier Globals and Dassault Falcons arrive in waves during the season. Airport police patrol the perimeter and the general aviation gates, so stay on public ground, never photograph through the fence of a fixed base operator and expect extra scrutiny during presidential visits.
What Comes Next
The county’s long term plan adds gates to Concourse B and builds a new 14 gate Concourse D extending east from the terminal. A new 73 metre (240 foot) control tower on the north side has already replaced the old one. The transcontinental routes due in late 2026 show that the airlines believe the market is deepening beyond the winter season.
The renaming brings its own uncertainties. The Trump Organization has filed to trademark the new name, and the FAA had to update its charts and databases for the change. For now West Palm Beach Airport is growing steadily, hemmed in by suburbs and noise sensitive neighbours but well placed to serve one of America’s wealthiest catchments. Place it alongside its Florida rivals on our Airports of the World map.
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