The lowdown on O'Hare's new runway

O'Hare International Airport has a brand-new runway and air traffic control tower to match. Here's the skinny on cost, length, height, width, impact on noise, impact on flights and other tidbits.

• In addition to O'Hare, Washington Dulles and Seattle-Tacoma international airports commissioned runways Thursday.

• The new runway is aligned east-west and will be used mainly for arrivals. The runway is 7,500 feet long and 150 feet wide with the capability of landing planes as large as 747s.

• The runway and air traffic control tower plus related construction cost $457 million. The air traffic control tower and its equipment had a $45 million price tag.

• The Federal Aviation Administration projects the runway and the extension of a southern runway completed in September will reduce flight delays from 16.2 minutes on average to 15.5 minutes. It's estimated the changes could lead to 52,000 more flights a year.

• Chicago hopes to complete its modernization program of six parallel runways and a western terminal by 2014.

• The National Air Traffic Controllers Association was critical of new runways at Dulles and Seattle but called the O'Hare facility a "step in the right direction." Its hours of operation will be from 6 a.m. to 10 p.m. It's 255 feet to the top of the roof antennas.

• Noise contours for the new runway, which is just south of Touhy Avenue at O'Hare's north end, will extend from the edge of the airport east past the Tri-State Tollway to Dee Road, the FAA estimates.