A second dress rehearsal is happening this weekend for the new terminal at Pittsburgh International Airport.

It’s a final exam of sorts, words that spawn butterflies and make students sweat. 

This time, the student is the new airport terminal and the examiner, 2,500 people from the Pittsburgh area. 

What depends on this final exam is when the new terminal will open.

When you spend $1.7 billion on a shiny new terminal, before you open it to travelers, you want some reassurance that everything is going to work, so Saturday’s test is critical.

“It’s testing the systems of the new airport,” said Bob Kerlik, Director of Public Affairs at the Allegheny County Airport Authority. “When we open the new airport, we want it to be ready. So it’s going to be day one operationally, but we want it to feel like it’s day 100 for passengers.”

Saturday’s test is the final, but certainly not the first test. 

“We’ve done over 50 trials in house ourselves,” Kerlik said. “And we’ve also done we had our first public trial about a month ago where we had about 500 people that have come through.”

This time, it will be 2,500 hundred simulated passengers arriving with everything that challenges an airport.

“We want to make sure that the baggage system has been tested,” Kerlik said. “We want to make sure that the ticket counters have been tested. We want to make sure that people know where they’re going in the parking garage and the signage makes sense.”

The number of faux passengers for the trial run is specific, to mimic the airport’s peak moment — a Monday morning after a home Pittsburgh Steelers game. 

Kerlik said the goal of the trial run will be to stress test the new terminal with the peak amount of people that you might see coming through the airport at a certain time.

And opening day for the new terminal hangs in the balance.

“We want to get through public trial,” Kerlik said. “We want to make sure we’re checking all of our boxes. If there’s any concerns that come up in that trial, we want to have a chance to evaluate those. Then we’ll announce the public opening date after that.”

People will come to the airport with their luggage, get a ticket at the ticket counter, check some luggage, go through security, and then reclaim their baggage in the new baggage claim area.

The trial run will begin Saturday at 9 a.m. and wrap by Noon. 

One of the critical areas that will be tested is security. 

The number of lines at the airport will increase from 7 to 12 in the new terminal and will feature new equipment expected to help move passengers and travelers trough the checkpoint more quickly. All the lines will be in the same area with no more alternative checkpoint.Â