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Move them to where? Cities large enough to merit an airport generally either have development which has expanded around them or physical features not conducive to development (mountains, lakes, etc.).

It's easy to say "just build bigger elsewhere" but unless you go dozens of miles out and add hours to every trip to/from the airport there's no options.

And no, "just fill in every body of water" is not an option. It doesn't work at all in many cases, is hilariously expensive in all cases, and has enormous environmental impact.

>>Araina+(OP)
I’m specifically suggesting using reclaimed land if they relocated the airport because the cost seems to work out for Chicago, though obviously an in depth analysis is necessary. Still just looking at the depths combined with lakes not having the downsides of open oceans makes it promising. Unfortunately we’re talking about a huge airport so moving anywhere gets incredibly expensive.

The ultimate reason so many cities use land reclamation for airports is open water does not lose property value by being near the airport. Thus a given greater metropolitan area regains not just the physical land of the airport but the increased property value from all that land that’s no longer next to an airport.