Can't build a bigger airport

[SugarySnax]

I wanted to destroy an old airport so that I could build a large airport. It wouldn't let me even though my rating with the town is outstanding and I own the airport. "Can't clear this area" is the message I got.

I tried the cheat, the magic bulldozer. The cheat came up. I checked magic bulldozer but I didn't see any bulldozer. Clicking on the bomb didn't help. Closing the airport didn't help. I should mention that I bought land all around this airport awhile back so that I'd have room for a bigger airport.

What are the exact things I have to do to delete an airport?

Is there a way to upgrade an airport without deleting the old one like in RRT3?

Also, I'm playing a much larger map now and there is something wrong with my cursor. Instead of an arrow I get clouds and zzz? After awhile it turns into the usual arrow pointer. Is there a way to fix this?

[Supercheese]

Make sure there are no aircraft in the hangar.

[Kalen]

Supercheese above already pointed to the likely reason you couldn't demolish your airport, but to reply to your other points/questions:

I tried the cheat, the magic bulldozer. The cheat came up. I checked magic bulldozer but I didn't see any bulldozer.

The magic bulldozer cheat is an "upgrade" to the regular demolish tool. It lifts restrictions on it to allow you to demolish things you normally can't (like all town buildings and roads, industries, transmitters/lighthouses), and it also allows you to demolish town buildings and roads without affecting the local authority rating. There's no separate bulldozer for it; you activate the cheat and then use the regular demolishing tool, only now with extended functionality.

Is there a way to upgrade an airport without deleting the old one like in RRT3?

Not to my knowledge, no. You do have a "close airport" button that prevents aircraft from landing on the airport as long as it's on, though, and that's most useful when replacing airports precisely.

EDIT: Actually, now I remember, you can in fact overbuild airports, but not in vanilla OpenTTD. You'd need to use cirdan's fork (think of it like a "modded" version) for that to be possible.

Also, I'm playing a much larger map now and there is something wrong with my cursor. Instead of an arrow I get clouds and zzz? After awhile it turns into the usual arrow pointer. Is there a way to fix this?

The clouds and zzz icon mean that the game is busy doing something (think of it like a hourglass icon). That usually happens when you're saving or autosaving the game (check if autosave is on) and that takes a bit longer on larger maps. If autosaving is off and it's happening outside of saving then I'm not sure what it might be.

[SugarySnax]

That was it. Got rid of the plane, restarted the computer and then I was able to delete the airport... so that's solved. Not sure if I used the cheat.

I still have this weird cursor with the cloud and the z's and its early in this game. Biggest cities are about 8000 but this is a huge map. The cursor is annoying. I didn't have that problem at all in previous games, even after running for almost a week and building up huge towns of 130,000.

Alright, just noticed the posts above and yes, autosave causes the cursor problem. I'll have to see if I can save less frequently when I quit.

I put a big airport up against a town that has a large AI presence and now I'm not getting a lot of cargo from this town. I'm guessing I made a foolish mistake building here and I'm just going to have to write this one off. This is my first experience with a more aggressive AI.

[Kalen]

You can adjust the autosave frequency in your settings (see here for more info), but in larger maps I think you might be better off just turning it off and remembering to save manually.

Regarding your new airport, you could buy exclusive transport rights in the town screen if you have the money, and then only your stations would receive any passengers and cargo for a full year.

[SugarySnax]

Thanks. That might be particularly pertinent because the one time I tried to load an auto save I discovered I could no longer get back to the regular saves thanks to the errr... primitive save load doohicky. There doesn't appear to be a back button. Might as well just turn autosaves off.

I now run a pretty sloppy business but I'm still making money. Scrolling is a problem. Figuring out which of the airports on the minimap is my airport is a problem. I don't find the minimap to be much help in this as it shows all the airports as red whether they're your airport or someone else's. The Chris Sawyer "have a million little windows open" thing gets out of hand frequently. The whole map covered with little windows or I forget what I was trying to do. Still fun though. Maybe having several monitors would be better if you can get all the little windows to be on the monitor you want.

There's something wrong with auto replace. I thought I knew what I was doing but planes are staying in hangars but not getting replaced and not coming out of hangars even though I thought I set it up to upgrade all old ships and I have the money. I have to do it by hand. All my airports have been enlarged but one.

What a gloriously aggravating sandbox game! It would have been so much cooler if they let you leave a temporary imprint of what you wanted to build
so that you could take down buildings and level land and then just click on finalize airport.

Exclusive rights for a year. I've looked into that. Its expensive. Does it drive out the competition? I noticed later that I am getting people at my airport so maybe just live side by side. Maybe my time would be best spent finding virgin territory. Trouble is I'm feeling lazy. If I get exclusive rights for a few years in a row will my opponent take down his airport?

[Kalen]

I discovered I could no longer get back to the regular saves thanks to the errr... primitive save load doohicky. There doesn't appear to be a back button.

The save/load menu has a folder structure in it that you can click. If you click the .. (Parent directory) line at the top it takes you to the previous folder in the structure. You can see what's the current path being looked at in the menu header above the saves list.

There's also a tiny house button next to the Date column that takes you to the default saves directory, i.e. your "home" directory. Here's a screenshot to illustrate:

Scrolling is a problem. Figuring out which of the airports on the minimap is my airport is a problem.

I suppose you could start using extra viewports, but that would exacerbate the "too many open windows" factor. One thing you can do is click the land owners button in the minimap (the last one in the bottom right, the one that looks like a person), which will colour infrastructure differently depending on which company owns it. This might help you find your airports more quickly. The station list (8th button in the toolbar counting from the left) is also very helpful, as long as you remember the name of the station you're looking for.

planes are staying in hangars but not getting replaced and not coming out of hangars even though I thought I set it up to upgrade all old ships and I have the money

I assume you meant autorenew? Did you configure the settings correctly (under Settings > Company > Autorenew etc.)? There's a toggle for it, and if it's off (which is the default), your vehicles won't be autorenewed at all. If you meant autoreplace (which is intended for replacing vehicle models, not renewing them when they get old) then I'd have to see how you configured it. But again, that's intended for a different use. Autorenew is what you'd want to use for renewing on/near old age.

It would have been so much cooler if they let you leave a temporary imprint of what you wanted to build so that you could take down buildings and level land and then just click on finalize airport.

You can purchase land to reserve it for yourself, and if you really want to you can change the settings so that you can build while paused. These should help you replace your airports if you find that towns are putting things in the way.

Purchasing land around airports in anticipation of an upgrade is a good strategy, however. It also allows you to change the landscape and the land will still be protected for your exclusive use.

Does it drive out the competition? (...) If I get exclusive rights for a few years in a row will my opponent take down his airport?

I don't know; since OpenTTD no longer uses the old TTDX AI and custom player-made AIs are how it works now, I guess it's all up to how the AI was coded to operate. I'd assume they'd be coded to demolish unprofitable routes if they can't make them profitable, but I'm not sure what they do in the case of exclusive rights. You could always test it out by cheating yourself some money, doing it, putting it on fast-forward and waiting to see what happens.