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The Biggest Airport In Florida Is Southwest Florida International

Author Joe Winner

I’m a big fan of the phrase “Today I Learned”. Well, I did learn something today. The biggest airport in Florida, and the third biggest in the United States – is Southwest Florida International Airport (RSW) here in Fort Myers.

Just to be clear, I’m not talking the busiest, we’re talking about the size of the airport. And if you’ve ever driven, or rode to, Southwest Florida International Airport, you know exactly what I’m talking about. It’s a long drive through a lot of nature.

Southwest Florida International Airport. The Biggest Airport In Florida - And 3rd Biggest In The Country
Lee County Port Authority
Southwest Florida International Airport

The Biggest Airport In Florida – And 3rd Biggest In The Country!

Here’s the top 3 (in size) airports in Florida.

Some quick math, Southwest Florida airport is over 21 square miles! How about another crazy stat: What would happen if they closed the airport, parceled out the land, and sold it to build condos? On the low end, undeveloped land in that area is going for roughly $50,000 an acre. That would put the value of the land alone at $677,750,000. That’s $677 MILLION. And we all know it’s worth even more than that. But that 13,555 acres doesn’t just make our Southwest Florida Airport the biggest airport in Florida, it’s one of the biggest in the whole country!

Why Is Our Airport So Big?

Around 6,000 acres of the airport property is set aside for environmental mitigation and swamp lands. That’s a lot of the area you see when you’re driving up to the terminal. But even if you didn’t count that part, RSW would still be bigger than airports such as Tampa (3,300 acres), and Miami (3,230 acres). So – since I brought it up, what’s the biggest airport in the United States?

Travelers pass through a TSA security checkpoint at Denver International Airport in Denver, Colorado. (Photo by Michael Ciaglo/Getty Images)

Denver is Even Bigger!

The Denver airport operates on 53 square miles (34,000 acres) of land. That means DEN’s area is twice the size of Manhattan, and larger than the city boundaries of Boston, Miami or San Francisco. More than double Fort Myers claim as the biggest airport in Florida. Heck, the Denver airport is even bigger than the whole city of Fort Myers, which is only 49 square miles! The Dallas-Fort Worth Airport is the second biggest in the country at 17,207 acres. That’s a distant second…

Related: 8 New Routes On Breeze Airways From RSW

The Biggest Airport In Florida

So there you have it. You learned something today. Fort Myers has the biggest airport in Florida, and the third biggest in the entire country. And it’s a really nice airport, too. My favorite. Smile

Joe Winner spends his days combing through memes and off beat stories to bring you the side of Florida not always seen.

The Best Local Cuisine Restaurants In Southwest Florida

Local Cuisine refers to the cooking and serving of dishes typical of the culture of the area. Many of the dishes contain food that has been produced within that area. So for Southwest Florida that of course means seafood. But that’s not all. There’s a lot of other fresh foods produced right here in the Sunshine State. Like oranges, tomatoes, watermelon, grapefruit, strawberries and more. Those locally grown crops are found on the plates in Florida restaurants that want the freshest foods possible. There’s also cattle ranches. Places like Beach Bistro on Anna Maria Island serve steaks from a ranch just north of North Port. Local. Southwest Florida restaurants that serve food from Florida. That’s what we mean by ‘local cuisine’ restaurants.

As a local, I know about these places. I can personally vouch for several of the rankings on the list. But rather than talk about my favorites, we’ll defer to the reviews on Tripadvisor. By using keywords and the site’s algorithms, I was able to pinpoint what they would consider the top 10 local cuisine restaurants in Southwest Florida. As a way to show my work, here’s a direct link to what I’ve done. Sure, there may be some places that you think should be on the list, but I don’t think you could say any of these places shouldn’t be mentioned.

If you’re from out of town, good, I’m glad you found this list for the best local cuisine.

It’s actually embarrassing how many people go to the chain restaurants when they come to Southwest Florida to visit. You can go to those places anytime. Also, this list stretches from Sarasota to the south end of Naples. So, some of these places won’t be very close, depending on where you are. Now let’s take a look at the best local cuisine restaurants in Southwest Florida. I’ll drop a couple a couple of links at the end for even more options.

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Author Joe Winner
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