How Airports Serve Louisiana
Mark Pearson
This map displays the major airports in and around Louisiana. It shows how the state can divided according to which airport is the closest as the crow flies.
The flags are a sample of 500 census tracts (of 1129 tracts total) within the state.
Some census tract flags may look like they are colored for one airport's region but are actually in another airport's region. The census tract flags are colored with which airport they are closest to as the crow flies along the surface of the earth (the Haversine distance formula). The region boundaries that are displayed on map were computed assuming assuming the earth is flat. (The lines that divide regions are a Voronoi diagram, and I couldn't find any algorithm that calculate the lines on a sphere such as the earth.) In short, although a few census tracts may look like they're mislabeled near a boundary, it's actually the boundary that is slightly wrong.
For more information, see the full report:
http://www.mark-pearson.com/airport-distances/

MSY serves 1,509,801 people in LA
Louis Armstrong New Orleans International Airport

BTR serves 876,934 people in LA
Baton Rouge Metropolitan Airport (Ryan Field)

LFT serves 842,631 people in LA
Lafayette Regional Airport

SHV serves 482,416 people in LA
Shreveport Regional Airport

AEX serves 429,298 people in LA
Alexandria International Airport

MLU serves 370,081 people in LA
Monroe Regional Airport

GPT serves 22,211 people in LA
Gulfport-Biloxi International Airport

dividing line

5,373 people
closest airport: MSY

1,084 people
closest airport: MSY

4,346 people
closest airport: MSY

closest airport: MLU

closest airport: LFT

closest airport: SHV

6 people
closest airport: AEX

closest airport: BTR

closest airport: AEX

568 people

929 people

closest airport: GPT