Over and Out : Airport: Moore will retire after 24 years as general manager of LAX. He built the complex into a world-class facility.

Clifton A. Moore, who oversaw Los Angeles International Airport’s transformation from a sleepy facility into the world’s third-busiest transportation hub, announced Tuesday that he will retire as the airport’s general manager after more than two decades on the job.

Moore, whose first position with the city in 1945 required him to climb atop City Hall to repair the beacon that once guided planes to the airport, said it is simply time for him to move on.

“It’s time for someone younger and more energetic to take over,” said Moore, who will be 71 in January and said he is feeling his age. “I’ll miss the activity and the excitement and the friends and people I’ve gotten to know well. But then I’m prepared for that. It’s just that I’ve worked at it a long time. I see the signs of change beginning to move in on me.”

The wry administrator--nicknamed Marco Polo because of his international travels promoting the airport--will be leaving the highest paying job in city government, with an annual salary of $181,812. He said he is uncertain of his future plans but is considering becoming a consultant for the Los Angeles airport and others.

Moore’s retirement comes at a time of uncertainty for the airport he helped build and that was instrumental in the growth of Los Angeles as a tourist and business destination.

City officials are considering leasing or selling the airport to a private operator to raise money for strapped city services. The City Council, which last year won voter approval of a ballot measure giving it greater authority over airport management, has put another measure on the November ballot seeking to divert airport revenues to city coffers.

In addition, the airport is preparing for the first time in 40 years to renegotiate operating agreements between itself and the airlines that use the facility, which last year served 46 million passengers--more than double the number handled when Moore became manager in 1968.

Only O’Hare International Airport in Chicago and the international airport in the Dallas/Ft. Worth area serve more passengers than the Los Angeles facility.

Robert Chick, president of the city Airport Commission, said he will push to find a successor to Moore from within city ranks. Moore, who as executive director of the Department of Airports also oversees city-owned airports at Ontario, Palmdale and Van Nuys, said he wants to leave in February--unless a successor is appointed earlier.

Mayor Tom Bradley Tuesday praised Moore for helping make the airport--the city’s largest single asset with $2 billion in property and an annual operating cost of $187 million--a major contributor to the city’s economic vitality.

“In 1976, the airport generated only $7.4 billion into our local economy,” Bradley said in a statement. “In 1990, the airport was responsible for infusing $37 billion in our local economy. More than 400,000 jobs are produced by our airport.”

A spokesman for Councilwoman Ruth Galanter, whose district includes the airport, lauded Moore for leading the Department of Airports through “decades of phenomenal growth,” making it “Southern California’s most important public resource.” Galanter’s spokesman said that under Moore’s leadership, the airport had also become “a better neighbor,” agreeing to build soundwalls and pay for soundproofing of neighboring homes.

Airport critics said Tuesday that Moore often was the No. 1 cheerleader for airport expansion without equal consideration for the impact on surrounding residential neighborhoods.

Danna Cope, a Westchester resident who sits on the airport’s citizens’ advisory committee, described Moore as “charming,” but added, “He felt what was best was to make the airport grow, and he did that very well. . . . He just wasn’t as sensitive to the impact the airport has . . . in terms of noise, air pollution and traffic.”

Don Schultz, president of the Van Nuys Homeowners Assn. and head of a group called Ban Airport Noise, said Moore gives people “the impression that he is a kindly, grandfatherly type, but he is a keen student of battling off adversaries of the airport. . . . I have a lot of respect for him.”

Despite the criticisms, Moore cites among his achievements his receipt in 1975 of the Federal Aviation Administration’s highest civilian award for his efforts to persuade airlines to use quieter planes.

Moore runs the department’s operations from an office in the airport’s control tower, six floors below the air traffic controllers. Moore’s key responsibility has been to oversee the physical layout of the airport--everything from negotiating terminal agreements with airlines and concessionaires to maintaining the four runways. The Federal Aviation Administration is in charge of air traffic operations.

A self-educated man forced to forgo college to help support his family during the Depression, Moore was hired at the airport in 1959 to supervise construction of the first jet terminal.

Back then, the facility consisted of a small terminal used to service propeller planes. It was also located at a different spot.

The present-day site was a vacant field. “I remember going on the field looking for holes where the rabbits hid,” Moore recalled Tuesday.

In 1961, a new “jet age” LAX was dedicated during a bash attended by then-Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson. Moore said the LAX built in 1961 was designed for the Boeing 707 and DC-8 jetliners of that era, not today’s jumbo jets.

After he became airport manager, Moore began planning the largest expansion of the airport--a $750-million plan that increased terminal space from 1 million to 2 1/2 million square feet. The plan culminated in the opening of Terminal 1, the Tom Bradley International Terminal and double-decking of the roadway. The renovation enabled the airport to handle wide-bodied aircraft such as 747s and DC 10s.

Moore also was the architect of the city’s purchase of nearly 18,000 acres in Palmdale for an airport that he hopes in the years ahead will grow as mass transit comes to the area and other airports become clogged.

The Director and His Airports THE MAN Name: Clifton A. Moore.

Position: Executive director of the Los Angeles Department of Airports.

Responsibilities: Operation of Los Angeles and Ontario international airports, Palmdale Regional Airport and Van Nuys Airport.

Annual salary: $181,823.

Number of employees: 1,500.

Appointed: By the mayor.

Years of city service: 39.

Annual pension: $129,600.

Personal: At age 21, Moore was the youngest chief petty officer in the U.S. Navy. Today, Moore and his wife, Betty, live in Culver City, where they bought their first home in 1949. They have two daughters and six grandchildren.

MILESTONES IN LAX HISTORY The city of Los Angeles leased 640 acres in an area known as Mines Field for a municipal airport in 1928. Two years later, the airport opened with a single terminal. Dedicated: In 1930 as a municipal airport.

First passenger flight: 1946.

First overseas flight: 1946.

First transcontinental flight: 1959.

First jet flight: 1959.

Major airport expansions:

In 1961, $60 million was spent to transform the airport into a jet-age facility with longer runways and eight new terminals.

In 1984, in time for the influx of Olympic Games visitors, an international terminal was built and the entire facility was double-decked at a total cost of $750 million.

THE AIRPORTS Here’s a look at the vast department Moore oversees:

LOS ANGELES INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT When Moore began with the department in 1959, Los Angeles International Airport was spread over 3,000 acres and housed 17 airlines. The airport was expanding rapidly by the time he became general manager in 1968. Today, with 550 additional acres and more than 100 airlines, LAX is the third busiest airport in the world.

1959 1968 1991 Airlines: 17 23 100 Passengers: 5.1 million 19.3 million 46 million Acres: 3,000 3,068 3,550 Revenues: $4.2 million $19.4 million $192.2 million Expenses: $922,000 $13.6 million $157 million Freight: 61,000 tons 381,000 tons 1.3 million tons

*VAN NUYS

Van Nuys Airport is the busiest general aviation airport in the nation, with 500,000 takeoffs and landings a year.

1959 1968 1991 Acres: 725 No change No change Revenues: $353,000 $775,000 $8.7 million Expenses: $153,000 $715,000 $8.5 million

*ONTARIO

In 1967, the city of Los Angeles acquired operational control of Ontario Airport, which had been used as a place to divert planes that were unable to land at LAX.

1968 1991 Airlines: 5 19 Passengers: 573,372 5.5 mil. Acres: 17.4 17.4 Revenues: $408,000 $25.1 mil. Expenses: $604,000 $24 mil. Freight: 326 tons 273,435

*PALMDALE

In the 1980s, this little-known airport was so underutilized that commercial flights were halted. In 1989, daily air service was reinstated.

1991 Airlines: 1 (Skywest) Passengers: 60,184 Acres: 17,750 Revenues: $489,000 Expenses: $2 million Freight: 8 tons

SOURCE: City of Los Angeles, Department of Airports

Compiled by Times researcher Cecilia Rasmussen