For generations of travelers, arriving at Washington Dulles International Airport has meant boarding one of its most recognizable — and unconventional — transportation options: giant bus-like “people movers” that shuttle passengers between the main terminal and several concourses.

Those signature vehicles may soon disappear, a prospect that has won strong support from United Airlines CEO Scott Kirby.

“I hate them. Terrible,” Kirby said of the mobile lounges during an interview this week with Washington Post Live.

The mobile lounges have been synonymous with Dulles since the Virginia airport opened in 1962. They were originally intended to move passengers efficiently across the vast airport grounds, sparing them lengthy walks between the terminal and their aircraft.

More than 60 years later, however, the system is widely seen as a relic of another era. Dulles is preparing to phase out the mobile lounges in favor of a larger rail network, new tunnels, moving walkways and expanded pedestrian routes.

The upgrades are part of an ambitious redevelopment plan for the airport, with nearly $20 billion in construction anticipated over the next 15 years.

Although Kirby has made clear he will not mourn the people movers, he supports the broader modernization effort. He said he believes the completed Dulles overhaul could create the best airport in the United States.

“This is the greatest country on earth, and the airport should help with that,” Kirby said.

President Donald Trump unveiled the planned Dulles transformation in July, framing it as part of a broader effort to reshape Washington and modernize major infrastructure across the nation’s capital region.

The Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority has approved an additional $15.5 billion for its capital construction program at Dulles, bringing the airport’s forward-looking construction budget to $19.9 billion over 15 years.

The Airports Authority says the program will be primarily financed through bonds and airport-generated revenue rather than designated taxpayer funding.

For travelers, one of the biggest changes will be the eventual retirement of the people movers, which have become one of Dulles’ most distinctive features.

Instead, the airport plans to extend its AeroTrain system, build a central tunnel connecting concourses and add more pedestrian connections and moving walkways.

The modernization will also replace the existing C and D concourses, while expanding and renovating other parts of the airport as passenger numbers continue to grow.

More than five million square feet of new or renovated space is planned, while the airport’s iconic original terminal, designed by famed architect Eero Saarinen, will be preserved.

The project is being carried out in phases, meaning travelers should not expect the people movers to disappear overnight.

Construction of the tunnels that will eventually replace them is expected to begin in early 2029, with that portion of the project scheduled for completion in 2034.

The wider transformation will take considerably longer, with some major concourse construction not expected to begin until the late 2030s.

The scale of the project is significant because Dulles is already a major international gateway, serving roughly 29 million passengers over the past year, according to the Airports Authority.

Trump has taken a particularly close interest in the redesign, personally reviewing more than 30 proposals before the July announcement.

Kirby was present at the White House event and acknowledged the president’s involvement when asked about the project.

‘The president was interested in it,’ Kirby said, noting that although Dulles is not really a federal government operation, Trump had taken a strong interest in its future.

Travelers have plenty of opinions about the people movers, too, with reactions ranging from relief at their planned retirement to passengers arguing that the shuttles can actually be quicker than the train for certain journeys.

One Reddit commenter argued that the people movers are still faster for reaching the C and D gates than taking the AeroTrain, while another said the airport’s current setup was the result of earlier planning decisions involving the location of the train station.

Others defended the mobile lounges, with one traveler calling them ‘fine’ and saying they can be faster than the trains when traveling to certain gates.

But international travelers have complained about crowded queues for the vehicles, while another Reddit user described walking between concourses as a lengthy alternative that left them exhausted and covered in sweat.

The frustration is not entirely new: the mobile lounges have long been criticized for being cramped and awkward, and one was involved in a crash at a concourse dock last year that sent at least 18 people to hospitals with non-life-threatening injuries, according to the Airports Authority.

For United, which has a major presence at Dulles, the transformation could have an especially noticeable impact, with the airline also set to receive additional lounge space, including plans for a large United Polaris Lounge.

The airline has already found itself in the middle of another Trump-related airport controversy this year after an internal memo appeared to suggest passengers unhappy with the renaming of Palm Beach International Airport could switch to nearby airports for no additional fare.

United later said the guidance was inaccurate, with a spokesperson telling the Daily Mail that the message was ‘poorly worded and not accurate.’

That episode involved a completely different airport and policy, but it adds to an unusual year for United as the airline navigates a series of changes involving airports and the Trump administration.

At Dulles, however, Kirby’s message is much simpler: he may hate the people movers, but he believes the airport that replaces them could finally give Washington the world-class gateway he thinks the capital deserves.

The Yankees viewed Wednesday’s game as one they could not afford to let slip, and they were prepared to empty the tank to chase down a win.

Trailing Minnesota 2-0 in the seventh inning, Aaron Boone pushed aggressively. With runners at second and third and the game close to getting away, he summoned Brent Headrick for his 77th appearance of the season, second most among major league pitchers behind only Toronto’s Mason Fluharty. Headrick escaped the inning, then came back out for the eighth, bringing his season workload to 75 ⅔ innings.

The move seemed to pay dividends in the ninth, when Anthony Volpe’s two-run double evened the score. But the comeback required even more mileage from the Yankees bullpen. Boone called on Paul Blackburn, who has now logged 81 ⅔ innings in his first full campaign as a reliever, to deliver a scoreless ninth. David Bednar followed for the 10th and, with neither club able to break through, the 11th as well. Bednar, already at 66 ⅓ innings and having thrown four high-pressure frames in the World Baseball Classic, added another 26 pitches with fewer than two weeks remaining before the postseason.

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Boone’s urgency was understandable. The Yankees are attempting to stay even with the Rays, and they know firsthand how much is at stake in winning the division and securing a first-round bye.

A Colombian human smuggler’s guilty plea has drawn renewed attention to a fatal migration route toward the United States, following the disappearance of a boat carrying 42 people at sea. A senior Justice Department official said those aboard would still have faced grave risks even if they had made it to shore.

Luis Enrique Linero Pinto, 41, known as “El Calvo,” entered a guilty plea in federal court in El Paso, Texas. He was extradited from Colombia over his alleged role in a smuggling network that prosecutors say relied on bribery and sea crossings to move migrants northward.

On Oct. 21, 2023, the vessel departed Colombia’s San Andrés Island for Nicaragua with about 40 migrants and two captains aboard. It never reached its destination, and none of the 42 people on board has been seen or heard from since.

“This was a particularly sad and disturbing situation,” Tysen Duva, the assistant attorney general who heads the Justice Department’s Criminal Division, told News Media.

“These 40 individuals and the two boat captains, once they set out from San Andrés Island to Nicaragua, were never heard from again,” Duva said. “These individuals are, of course, missing and presumed dead, and it appears that there were no survivors.”

Duva said the disappearance underscores the extreme dangers created by transnational smuggling groups, which exploit vulnerable migrants as they seek routes leading toward the United States.

“It’s all about money,” he said. “Anybody who’s involved with a cartel or transnational smuggling in this regard, it is about money. It’s about preying on people’s misfortune.”

The Justice Department said Linero Pinto instructed migrants on how to travel to San Andrés Island, met them when they arrived, arranged housing and transported them to boats headed for Nicaragua.

From there, the migrants intended to travel through Central America and Mexico before illegally entering the United States, prosecutors said.

Linero Pinto also bribed members of the Colombian navy to obtain real-time intelligence about the positions of patrol vessels between San Andrés Island and Nicaragua, allowing smuggling boats to evade authorities, according to court documents.

He admitted helping smuggle the migrants aboard the boat that vanished in October 2023.

Duva said the victims had not even completed the opening stretch of the dangerous route when they disappeared.

“That’s the first leg. They didn’t even finish the first leg here and get to Nicaragua and then try to come north by land,” he said. “It’s a really long journey, and it’s full of really bad things that can happen.”

The danger, he warned, is not confined to the open water.

Duva said migrants can face treacherous terrain while traveling through South and Central America and across the U.S.-Mexico border. Even those who reach the United States may be trapped by mounting debts and pushed into sex trafficking, he warned.

“You pay money to come to the United States, and then when you get here, the co-conspirators or those involved in the criminal enterprise will say, ‘But now you owe more, and you’re going to work this off in the sex trade,’” Duva said.

“Cross-border smuggling cases often times just morph right into human trafficking cases,” he continued. “The crime sort of changes along the way. The travelers are the ones victimized, and this comes at a significant cost in terms of public safety.”

Linero Pinto was charged in October 2024 and arrested in Colombia that December at the request of the U.S. government. He was later extradited to the United States and made his first appearance in federal court in El Paso in December 2025.

He pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit alien smuggling and placing lives in jeopardy. He faces a maximum sentence of 20 years in federal prison, though a sentencing date has not been set.

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A case against alleged co-conspirator Hernando Manuel de la Cruz Rivera Orjuela remains pending, Duva said.

The prosecution is part of Operation Take Back America and was coordinated by Joint Task Force Alpha, the Justice Department-led initiative targeting cartels and other transnational organizations involved in high-impact human smuggling and trafficking.

Duva praised President Donald Trump and his administration for putting a “tremendous focus” on the initiative and providing the Justice Department with additional resources to pursue smugglers, cartels and other transnational criminal organizations.

“We’re super thankful to President Trump,” Duva said. “We’re deeply thankful to the White House for that. We’re thankful to Congress for that, and we’re going to keep doing what we’re doing.”

Duva said funding approved through Trump’s signature One Big Beautiful Bill allowed the Criminal Division to hire additional prosecutors and place experienced attorneys in sections handling the administration’s priorities.

“People think, ‘Well, what is that? What did it do?’” he said. “We’re feeling the effects of that. We’re able to put skilled prosecutors in these different sections to attack these administration priorities.”

Duva said the task force is hunting criminal networks along the southern border, maritime routes near Florida and the northern border with Canada.

“We are focusing on these cases at any border that we have,” he said.

His warning to smugglers operating beyond America’s borders was blunt.

“Our reach is substantial,” Duva said. “We are going to chase these cases no matter where they originate from or where we find them.”

Duva said the department’s expanded international partnerships are critical because the criminals behind the operations often believe distance will protect them from prosecution.

“They just think, ‘Well, they catch other people, but they’re not going to get me,’” he said. “You really try to combat that one case at a time.”

Joint Task Force Alpha has produced more than 483 domestic and international arrests, over 436 U.S. convictions and more than 371 significant prison sentences, according to the Justice Department.

Duva said the mission should transcend partisan fights because the networks being targeted threaten migrants and American communities alike.

“It shouldn’t be partisan,” he said. “It should be obvious that anybody who’s in the White House, anybody who is in Congress, should be lauding these cases and the work that’s being done by Criminal Division entities like Joint Task Force Alpha.”

The Justice Department’s ultimate goal, Duva said, is the “total elimination” of cartels and the criminal organizations profiting from human suffering.

“You do it one case at a time,” he said. “We are focused on doing the very best cases that we can for the American people. That’s what we get up every day and think about.”

For Duva, however, the vanished boat remains a haunting illustration of why that mission matters.

“I don’t know that I’ve ever heard of anybody who survives that one after several months and a year,” Duva said. “It’s super tragic, and hopefully people realize when they hear about this case just how dangerous it is and how important it is that you target these smuggling groups.”