Nashville Begins Process of Renaming Airport After Dolly Parton

Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee and Nashville International Airport (BNA) announced on August 28 that they intend to rename the airport in honor of musician Dolly Parton, who died August 25 at age 80.

At the time of publishing, the move isn't final. The Metropolitan Nashville Airport Authority board takes up the proposal on September 17, along with changes to its own naming policy, which requires that a person be deceased for two years and have made a significant contribution to aviation in Tennessee. Nashville's Metro Council backed the change on September 1 in a symbolic vote.

For travelers, this is signage. The open question is the code: BNA stands for Berry Field Nashville and survived the 1988 switch to Nashville International. New Orleans is the closest precedent here. It became Louis Armstrong New Orleans International in 2001 and kept MSY, a code left over from the Moisant Stock Yards that once sat on the site.

Andrew's Take

Airport renaming campaigns usually stall out — Pittsburgh tried for years to get Fred Rogers onto PIT and never got there. This one feels different, mostly because I haven't seen anyone come out against it, and the board can always revisit a waiting period it set for itself. Either way, I'd expect BNA to stay BNA on your boarding pass.