My husband and I live in Central Florida, so our “home” airport certainly isn’t small. In fact, MCO is currently the busiest airport in the state of Florida and among the top 10 busiest airports in the country. And when we lived up north, our home airport was Newark. Also not exactly tiny.
Which isn’t to say we haven’t been to some really tiny airports that offered commercial flights. Key West. Grand Junction. Ayers Rock. All of those commercial airports were small. But none of them prepared me for this place.
Where Was This Tiny Airport?
It was Lancaster Airport, a.k.a. LNS, located in Lancaster, Pennsylvania.
LNS has been around since 1936. It was initially developed as a private airport but was becoming obsolete by the end of World War II. So its owner, the Lancaster Airport Authority, used government funds to expand and modernize it. Upgrades occurred again in the mid-1990s.
LNS began subsidized Essential Air Service (EAS) in 2004. Over the years, that service was provided by Air Midwest, Cape Air and Sun Air Express. It’s currently provided by Southern Airways Express.
For a time, American Airlines offered bus service to LNS. You’d fly to Philadelphia International Airport and then take a charter bus—excuse me…motor coach. You’d take a motor coach—to LNS. I was intrigued and allllllmost got to experience that in 2023, but it didn’t happen because of reasons.
Anyway, not long after American Airlines pulled out of LNS, Breeze Airways pulled in. They’ve been offering twice-weekly flights to and from MCO since October 2024. United Express launched weekly service between Lancaster (LNS) and Washington Dulles (IAD), operated by Southern Airways Express, in April 2025.
LNS also boasts:
- Flight schools
- Helicopter rides
- Hot air balloon rides
- Aircraft maintenance
- Airport tours
My Experience At LNS
I have a friend, Kim, who lives in Lancaster. The two of us put our heads together and decided that since Breeze offers that nonstop service between MCO and LNS, and who knew how long it would last, I should take advantage of it. So I visited her for a long weekend.
Kim Wasn’t Exaggerating
Kim warned me that LNS was small. I didn’t realize just HOW small it was.
Audience: How small was it?
It was so small that I had to search to find the “blank.”
Duhm duhm du-du-du du-duhm
Duhm duhm du-du-du du-duhm
#IYKYK
And if you’re too young to get the Match Game reference…well…welcome to the internet, where Gen X occasionally shows up. 😉
So anyway, Kim did say it was small. But I had no idea how tiny it was until I landed.
I was expecting an outdoor ramp instead of a jet bridge, and LNS did not disappoint. What I didn’t expect was only having to walk about 100 to 150 feet to get inside…because when there’s only one commercial plane at the airport, they can park it REALLY close to the terminal.
View from just outside the terminal
And About The Terminal
The terminal was indeed tiny. In fact, it reminded me more of one of the buildings you sometimes see in national parks, where the park rangers answer questions and hand out trail maps, than an airport terminal.
The terminal had one men’s room and one ladies’ room.
It also had an Italian restaurant.
And if you weren’t in the mood for a sit-down meal, it also had two vending machines, as seen in the photo above, which was a problem. The vending machines were both outside the TSA checkpoint. If you wanted to buy a soda, you had to drink it before you went through the checkpoint. On the airside, there were no vending machines or restrooms, either. There was a water cooler, though.
It also had one desk for Breeze and one for Southern Airways Express.
And I was pleasantly surprised to see rental car desks for National, Enterprise, Avis and Budget.
Oh, and for a real answer to “How small was it?” LNS is so small that it doesn’t have a baggage carousel. They put all the checked luggage onto a baggage carrier train, then drive it out front, outside the terminal’s entrance—because there’s only one entrance, of course—so people can claim their bags.
Flying Back Home From LNS
All good things must come to an end, and it was time to go home.
After Kim dropped me off at LNS, I got a good giggle at the signage that met me about 10 feet into the terminal.
The Breeze check-in desk is about 50 feet past that arrow, and TSA is directly across the hallway from there.
Since ours was the only plane—an A220-300—and it held 137 people max, and it didn’t that day, since there were probably only about 100 onboard, you’d think getting through TSA would take all of five minutes.
Yeah, not so much.
But it wasn’t because LNS is such a small airport. It was because they had just gotten a brand-spankin’-new CT scanner three days earlier, and the TSA officers were still being trained on how to use it.
PC: TSA.gov
So I wound up in the TSA line for 51 minutes. Fortunately, I got there 45 minutes before boarding was scheduled to start. More fortunately, boarding was delayed.
And happily, I got my green PreCheck card from the TSA officer who checked my ID. And yeah, they need to revise their green cards. 😉
Final Thoughts On Flying Through LNS
Flying through Lancaster was honestly kind of refreshing.
Sure, it has its quirks. If you want a drink after going through TSA, you’re out of luck. If you check a bag, don’t go looking for a baggage carousel because there isn’t one. And if TSA happens to be training on a brand-new scanner…bring a little extra patience.
But everything else was wonderfully simple.
No hiking half a mile to your gate. No trains. No trams. No giant crowds.
Just one tiny terminal, one commercial flight at a time, and an airport that somehow felt more like a neighborhood community building than a commercial airport.
Would I fly through LNS again?
Absolutely.
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8 comments
Such a trip down memory lane! Thank you!
Lancaster is my hometown. I lived and played next to an Amish farm through the Third Grade. The airport is a source of local pride.
The quirks you found are remarkable but not unique. The USA has a handful of other airports sans baggage carousel, such as AXS. Fortunately, we are, broadly speaking, an honest people who respect the honor system of not stealing anyone’s luggage.
BGR suffered without airside lavatories for many years. The solution was to extend the plumbing into the secure area and construct a relief pavilion, complete with bottle filling station. Fortunately, unlike LNS, the floor plan allowed for this without sacrificing the bulk of the seating for the surrounding gates.
Even so, passengers departing from the gates used by United Airlines must traverse the security checkpoint’s exit (without being scanned again) to use the facilities near the AA and DL side of the house.
Cool stuff but there are A LOT of smaller airports. You should check out Noel Phillips on YouTube for small airports.
In college, in 1980s, Ithaca, NY airport, US Airways and Mohawk Airlines would drive the luggage to the front door. Which was 1 little small rectangular 1 story building that looked and felt like a DMV office. Ithaca subsequently built a new terminal building, but still small.
Even smaller. 2008. Quepos Airport (Quepos is gateway to Parque Manuel Antonio in Costa Rica) has 1 grass runway and 1 corrugated sheet-metal hanger, which contained everything – airline check-in counter, snack bar, aircraft maintenance (parts, tools, and all). You stood next to the airplane while the flight crew fetched and handed the 6 or so passengers our luggage. Next to them was vehicles waiting to pick up passengers – a car for 1 couple, and a small van that the rest of us apparently had booked. Didn’t make advance ground transportation arrangements? Ask at the snack bar! Or maybe think quickly to ask to go with someone else’s ride before they leave (one of the other passengers did that and joined the van ride). That’s it. There was nothing else there except jungle surrounding the runway and hanger.
I agree that there are a lot of smaller airport. I have been to many small airports. For example Los Alamos.
Latrobe, Pennsylvania – a small perfectly run great Airport – Spirit threw many flights out of there to many places over the years. Unfortunately, nobody in there at the current time until they find another carrier to come there
City of Derry Airport, in the North of Ireland, is also interesting as a small airport. It has connections to Glasgow, Edinburgh, Liverpool and shortly to Dublin. The security is about 50 metres from the front door of the airport building and it takes less than 5 minutes to pass through. The Amelia Earhart Business Lounge is literally 2 minutes walk from the aircraft steps.
A bit parochial of you to wonder about how “small” this airport is. And by parochial I mean, US-centric (who knew?). Hello, there are thousands of smaller, even tiny, airports around the world, I personally have flown into dozens of them, try Lamu in Kenya, Gizo in Solomon Islands, Lethem in Guyana, Dole in France, Khovd in Mongolia, etc.