SkyLink is an automated people mover system currently in testing to serve Los Angeles International Airport (LAX). The line will include six stations linking the LAX Rental Car Center, the Metro Rail system, and the LAX West Intermodal Transportation Facility (West ITF) with the airport’s central terminal area. The system will be owned by Los Angeles World Airports (LAWA). LAX Integrated Express Solutions (LINXS)—a public–private partnership of ACS, Alstom, Balfour Beatty, Fluor and Hochtief, with assistance from HDR and Flatiron West—was awarded a 25-year contract to design, build, finance, operate, and maintain the line.
Construction was initially scheduled for completion in 2023, but the opening has been repeatedly delayed, and LAWA has not announced a firm opening date. The Los Angeles City Council stepped in on June 26, 2026, referring the issue to the Trade, Travel, and Tourism Committee. The project is the subject of litigation as of July 9, 2026, as testing continues (see ). On September 20, 2026 the lender longstop date was aligned with the project longstop date of December 8, 2026, a two-month delay.
The Los Angeles Department of Water and Power (LADWP) to the LAX Skylink Automated People Mover trains is expected.
A contract arbitrator previously found LAWA responsible for nearly two years of delay, and a Los Angeles County Civil Grand Jury report concluded that the project’s setbacks stemmed from a strained relationship between LAWA and the LINXS consortium, political pressure to finish the system before major regional events, and shortcomings in the contract’s dispute-resolution provisions. In total, LAWA has agreed to more than US$880 million in dispute-related payments, in addition to the project’s US$4.9 billion, 25-year cost.
When will it open? The official announcement gives no date: "SkyLink is not open to travelers yet. The system is in its final testing and certification phase. Opening information will be posted on this page." Regarding the transition to public use, officials noted that the timeline depends on safety results: "This first phase of testing will take approximately 60 days, at which point then we'll be able to put volunteers on the train to test what it would be like with passengers. And then once that phase is complete and all of the regulatory agencies have signed off, we'll be able to be fully operational," quoting Vanessa Rodriguez, LAWA spokesperson, at the beginning of system demonstration testing which has restarted multiple times since April, 2026.
Service description
Route description SkyLink will run along a line of six stations, with parallel tracks forming a pinched loop.
SkyLink will serve three stations in the central terminal area (CTA) each with footbridges with moving walkways to nearby terminals. The west station will serve terminals 3, 4, and B (the Tom Bradley International Terminal), the center station will serve terminals 1, 2, 5, and 6, and the east station will serve terminals 7 and 8 with a future connection to terminal 1. Continuing to the east, the line will travel over Sepulveda Boulevard and skirt along the airfield where Terminal 9 is planned.
At that point, the line turns to the north, crossing Century Boulevard to reach the LAX West Intermodal Transportation Facility (ITF), a large parking structure with a park-and-ride area, and access to nearby hotels.
From there, the route continues east along 96th Street, passing the line's maintenance yard, crossing over the Metro Rail tracks as it arrives at the East ITF station atop the LAX/Metro Transit Center. This station will offer connections to the Los Angeles Metro Rail system and local buses.
Trains then travel a short distance to the east and enter the LAX Rental Car Center (RCC), a massive parking structure that will house all major rental car companies operating at LAX.
Hours and frequency SkyLink is expected to operate 24 hours a day. During peak hours (9 a.m. to 11 p.m.), trains will arrive every two minutes. The line will have a 10-minute end-to-end travel time. Rolling stock
The SkyLink fleet will consist of 44 Innovia APM 300 vehicles manufactured by Alstom (initially Bombardier Transportation). Each vehicle can accommodate up to 50 passengers and their luggage, with 12 seated and the rest standing. During peak periods, nine four-car trains will operate simultaneously. Trains will operate with a top speed of and an average speed, including stops, of .
Each four-car train can accommodate up to 200 passengers. During peak hours, with a headway of every two minutes, up to 30 trains per hour are expected to enter LAX, carrying up to 6,000 passengers per hour per direction and up to 84,000 daily peak-hour passengers, or up to 30.7 million annual peak-hour passengers. The opposite direction capacity will be the same, enabling the system to theoretically transport up to 85 million passengers annually in both directions, including up to 23.7 million non-peak passengers.
Station listing The following is the complete list of stations, from west to east. +Station NameConnections and notesAWest Terminals: 3, 4, , Parking Garages: P3, P4BCenter Terminals: 1, 2, 5, 6, Parking Garages: P2a, P2b, P5, P6CEast Terminals: 7, 8, Parking Garages: P1, P7, Theme Building, Bob Hope USO, Future connection to Terminal 1DTerminal 9Future infill stationEWest ITFEconomy parking garage, hotel shuttles, rideshare and taxi pick-up/drop-off, access to Airport BlvdFEast ITF LAX/Metro Transit Center, private vehicle pick-up/drop-off, LAX FlyAway, charter buses, access to Aviation Blvd, future economy parking garageGRCCLAX Rental Car Center
Architecture The six SkyLink stations each feature a line of 20-foot diameter circular skylights, with an additional one in the mezzanine of the LAX/Metro Transit Center. The West ITF parking garage also features similar circular lighting fixtures.https://www.lawa.org/connectinglax/construction-photos/2021-february (photo #13) The new pedestrian walkways employ a Vierendeel truss, featuring rectangular rather than triangular bracing. The old-style pedestrian walkways with triangular bracing still service parking lots P1, P4, P5, and P7. The SkyLink concrete guideway features "gentle sweeping curves and clean uniform look". Each station features a single island platform, with level boarding, which serves trains in both directions. The proposed Terminal 9 infill station is the exception, with a pair of separate side platforms serving both directions.
The East CTA station features a viewing platform for the Theme Building (see Gallery).
History
Background
The Los Angeles International Airport has long struggled with gridlocked traffic on World Way, the main road that circles through the airport's central terminal area, that can often back up onto Century Boulevard or the Airport Tunnel, which connect the airport to Interstate 405 and Interstate 105 respectively.
Ahead of the 1984 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles, a second level was added to World Way, sending vehicles dropping off departing passengers to the upper level and those picking up arriving passengers to the lower. The relief was short-lived, and by the 2000s, the airport had ranked as one of the nation's most congested and hardest to navigate. That led airport managers to spend over US$15 billion to modernize the airport, with an automated people mover (APM) being one of the major improvements. The project was given added urgency in 2017 when Los Angeles was awarded its bid to host the 2028 Summer Olympics.
Further urgency involved the 2026 FIFA World Cup and the 2027 Super Bowl. In July 2024, Mayor Karen Bass stated that "it absolutely has to be finished by the time of the World Cup."
Planning
After receiving three bids, Los Angeles World Airports announced it had chosen LAX Integrated Express Solutions (LINXS) to design, build, finance, operate and maintain SkyLink for a period of 25 years. LINXS is a joint venture, public–private partnership of ACS, Alstom, Balfour Beatty, Fluor and Hochtief, with assistance from HDR and Flatiron West. The Los Angeles City Council approved the US$4.9 billion project on April 11, 2018. Of the total amount, US$1.9 billion was allocated for initial design and construction.
Beyond the construction of the SkyLink guideway and stations, LAX has also planned several projects that will enable or connect to SkyLink. New vertical cores will be built near each terminal, enabling vertical movement of passengers with elevators and escalators, as well as pedestrian bridges over World Way with moving walkways to connect terminals to the SkyLink stations and to existing airport parking structures. LAX is building cores between terminals 5 and 6, at terminals 7 and at terminal B (the Tom Bradley International Terminal) at the cost of $490 million. New cores were also included in larger renovation projects at terminals 1, 2, 3 and 4.
SkyLink will also connect to the LAX West Intermodal Transportation Facility (West ITF), a US$294.1 million, 4,300 space parking structure with a lot to pick up and drop off passengers and areas for shuttle buses, the LAX Rental Car Center (RCC), a massive parking structure that houses all of the major rental car companies that operate at LAX in one location located adjacent to Interstate 405, and to the LAX/Metro Transit Center (East ITF), connecting passengers to the Los Angeles Metro Rail C and K Lines and other transit services.
Altogether, these projects are called the Landside Access Modernization Program and are expected to cost a total of US$5.5 billion. By 2035, SkyLink is projected to reduce vehicle travel in the CTA by about 27% and eliminate more than 3,200 daily car-rental shuttle trips.
Construction In 2018, 2,100 parking spaces in lot C were removed to reconfigure the area for the West ITF. Utility relocation started in the second quarter of 2018. Construction on the West ITF officially began in the summer of 2019 and ConRAC broke ground in September 2019. The first large concrete pour for SkyLink occurred in September 2020 at the West ITF station.
Construction on the of two-track elevated guideway began in the spring of 2019 with the first underground support columns being placed. The first concrete for the columns was poured in January 2020. The pouring of the concrete for the guideway began in September 2020 and it was completed in May 2022. A total of 69,700 cubic yards (53,300 m3) of concrete was poured and one million work hours were completed to complete this project.
Connecting Los Angeles's Metro Rail system to the airport, which was studied by transit planners since the 1980s, started when Metro commenced construction on the LAX/Metro Transit Center on June 21, 2021. The new station will connect Metro and other transit services to the East ITF station. The new station will link SkyLink to the C and K rail lines, Metro Bus, and other municipal bus operator lines. Additionally, a customer service center and Metro Bike Hub will be constructed.
After two years of construction, West ITF's economy parking structure opened on October 19, 2021. Until SkyLink opens, temporary shuttle buses transport passengers between the airport and the facility.
, overall construction progress was 97.3% complete. On April 29, 2024, the project test drove the one-car Maintenance Service Vehicle on the guideway between the Maintenance and Storage Facility (MSF), West ITF, and ConRAC.
Construction delays Construction of the line was originally scheduled for completion in March 2023, but the project has experienced multiple delays. In August 2025, Fitch Ratings projected that construction would be completed in January 2026, with testing and commissioning continuing through June 2026.
In addition to delays attributed to disputes between LAWA and LINXS, there are reports of legal disputes between LINXS and some subcontractors potentially causing further delays.