Southwest Airlines Rushes To Open Austin And Nashville Lounges By June 2027—6 Cities Planned, 5 More Could Be Next

Southwest Airlines still hasn’t ‘officially’ announced plans to open airport lounges, but they’ve made no secret of it. They’ll introduce a new premium credit card with Chase offering lounge access, and they’ve secured space in several airports. And their first lounges are racing towards completion. The Nashville Business Journal says the Nashville airport lounge will be first. Hensel Phelps Construction lists a June 28, 2027 opening target for that lounge. Since this is based on construction documents, the publication is likely claiming this is first only because they haven’t seen my reporting on the details of Southwest’s Austin lounge. I was first to exclusively reveal plans for a Southwest Airlines lounge at the Austin airport. The construction permit revealed a target completion date of March 1, 2027. This is the West Infill Premium Lounge space that was originally targeted to be a bank lounge. It’s above the new security checkpoint. I do not expect actual completion and opening in March. These schedules slip, just as the June 2027 date for Nashville is likely to slip. But Austin and Nashville both seem to be racing to be the airline’s first lounge. The full known Southwest Airlines lounge pipeline is: Honolulu: where there’s an approved five-year Southwest lease for 9,577 square feet and amendment adding additional space and granting a 12-month rent waiver conditioned on substantial space improvements. Nashville: permits issued and contractor schedule in place for a 30,000 square foot lounge in South mezzanine above Acme Feed & Seed, in the post-security central Marketplace Large oval are. It will offer bar, buffet and grab-and-go station, mother’s room plus a children’s area featuring a treehouse, climbing wall and interactive light-up floor piano. Austin: permit issued. Denver: CEO Bob Jordan has said Southwest is leasing space. The lounge will presumably be in the Concourse C East expansion. Dallas Love Field: the airport is developing lounge space and Southwest is the only possible user. They have 90% of the gates at the airport and it’s their headquarters. Washington National: redevelopment of the historic terminal A will include a 10,000 square foot lounge. Southwest is the dominant carrier in the terminal. So unless they reverse course on plans for lounges this will be theirs come the 2030s. Southwest and Chase surveyed details on a card at the $395 – $650 price point that would include access to the airline’s lounges, as well as potentially a Priority Pass card (at least initially Southwest’s lounge access wouldn’t be very large). It would be fascinating if at least some of the lounges were co-branded with Chase such that Chase got joint Sapphire lounges as part of the deal, or if the Southwest card came with Sapphire lounge access as well. Jordan keeps saying that “there’s work underway” on lounges but that they’re “not ready to formally announce that yet” because lounges tier up to the credit card and the premium credit card needs to be queued up too. The lounges aren’t going unannounced because there’s uncertainty about lounges. He even recently declared lounges the next highest priority after Starlink which they are already doing. The loyalty programs and co-brand are a huge part of the financials of an airline, and having long haul, aspirational destination kind of routes really, really enhances the co-brand program as well. It’s as much a part of that. That’s as much the reason as it is even destinations that our customers want. They’re presumably scouring for space at other airports. My guesses for where they go next: Baltimore. Southwest has 230 daily departures. The airport’s new A/B connector serves Southwest gates and is 142,000 square feet of new construction and includes 28,000 square feet of shell space reserved for future concessions. Houston Hobby. Southwest and Houston are building a $470 million West Concourse expansion with seven additional gates, and more restaurants and retail, which is scheduled for completion next year. The project doesn’t have a lounge in its published scope. Orlando. Southwest operates about 170 departures. The airport is now planning the third phase of Airside 2, with at least seven additional gates and completion targeted by 2030. Southwest operates from Airsides 2 and 4. Chicago Midway seems like an obvious place to want a Southwest lounge. The airline is 90% of passengers there. I just don’t know where they’d put one. There’s a 3,265 square foot The Club as the airport’s only current lounge. At some price they could probably acquire it, a premium Southwest card will include Priority Pass access perhaps and they might consider Midway covered, but they could also take concessions space and build a small grab-and-go along the lines of United Club Fly and American’s Provisions. St. Louis eventually after the terminal is rebuilt. Southwest currently has 17 gates in Terminal 2. The only space there may be the 2,700 square foot Wingtips Lounge. However the planned consolidated terminal which Southwest expects to move into around 2031 and is supposed to be completed shortly thereafter is likely to include lounge space in the design process. Southwest may be too late for San Diego, which will see an Escape Lounge built in available space by its gates. Phoenix would be perfect, but Chase occupies the logical space. Eventually terminal modernization of Oakland could produce space for a lounge. Sacramento will see concourse expansion in a few years. Finding space is the biggest challenge, airport space has already been largely picked over in desirable cities, so it’s often when new concourse construction gets planned that these possibilities open up. Topics on this page