So, why aren’t taxi-ways marked with a big X like the unusable runways?
X markings mean “Don’t Go Here”, including by taxiing.
Then perhaps another letter? The idea being “Don’t land here.” being clearly visible to pilots.
I’ve always thought a good solution to complicated taxiways would be painting the pavement different colors. Then controllers could taxi you by saying, “Green, red, blue to runway 28R”. No looking at signs that are often offset from the taxiways and confusing, especially when they branch out into multiple routes (I’m looking at YOU KJFK!).
Of course, the problem there is the expense. And the color blind pilots. And the fading over time. And foreign pilots having to learn a lot of new words for colors. OK fine, it’s a stupid idea…
Would that not be a bit of a problem at night from altitude?
The illuminated X on closed runways is usually a big sign that they put in the middle of the runway. It physically blocks the runway. Since airplanes need to be able to use taxiways, the only thing you can do is put some kind of lighting system on the surface, but that’s pretty hard to see from far away.
How about a nice big flashing T?
I told you it was a stupid idea! 
Late at night, dog tired and arriving at a familiar place, my mind would sometimes see what it expected to see. Happens to people a lot actually. A really ‘obvious’ way of getting attention is really a much bigger thing than just a monotone advisory listened to earlier or in the midst of a busy time. What seems obvious to those in their chairs at home does not automatically to those in the middle of it.
A tight instrument approach to a strange/new to me place could be really confusing for a short time if it was not what I was expecting to see when I broke out seconds before touchdown and knowing I have very little time to get it straight in my head. ‘Sweating bullets’ is what comes to mind.
Boston-Logan Airport has the word “TAXI” in giant yellow letters at the “approach” ends of taxiway M, the full-length parallel taxiway between both of the 4-22’s.
The main reason is that you’re only 15-30 seconds away from touchdown when any marking that tiny is actually discernable. That’s real last ditch.
Here’s a pic of the “great big” lighted X that’s used to mark a closed runway. closed runway x - Google Search
Even at this small distance it’s small. At night it’s slightly more visible against an otherwise dark background.
As noted above, there are certain airport configurations that are especially problematic. And extra markings get added to them as experience dictates. But even so, any such markings will only reduce the number of touchdowns on taxiways; they won’t do anything for mistaken approaches towards the wrong surface that get aborted at the last moment when the markings are finally seen.
IOW, extra pavement markings would have done exactly zero for the error in this thread. Those guys had already started going around at about the same time they’d have been able to see any detailed pavement markings.
Here’s one that isn’t parallel(along with one that is). (three 4500-ft runways-triangular, built by US Navy)
That was the bog-standard shape for military airports built before and during WWII. At one time there were hundreds, if not a thousand, such airports in the US. Many still exist whether in use or abandoned.
In the days of tailwheel airplanes crosswinds were a bigger deal, rural land was cheap and most of the USA was rural, and the military did not care about cost effectiveness, so using 4x the land and 3x the concrete to get just one usable runway no matter which way the wind was blowing was just fine with them.
Nowadays with the need for multiple runways to handle the required throughput and the much greater cost of land, parallel is the only game in town. As noted upthread there are legacy airports such as ORD & BOS which are variations on either triangles or asterisks. Or at least started out that way and have been extended and expanded while keeping some of their original configuration.
SFO, the source of this thread, started life as an L shape with 2 runways. The runways were later extended into a + or cross shape. Later a parallel second runway was added alongside each original to make each leg of the cross a two-runway set in parallel. So now the center of the airport is 4 closely-spaced runways crossing at 90 degrees; looking like a giant version of the intersection of two railroad tracks.
Typically they operate SFO to land on one set of parallels and take off on the crossing set of parallels. Between that interaction and the fore-aft stagger required between two landings on alternating runways and the stagger required between two takeoffs on alternating cross runways, there’s plenty of careful timing required.
There was an airport I found while messing around in Flight Simulator once. It was four runways laid out in perfect 45-degree angles, like an asterisk with an extra line. It was so odd that I looked for more information about it. Found it on a website about old, disused airports. From what I remember it was military, and probably pre-WW2.
I think I found the website, but haven’t found that airport yet. I would have sworn it was in Alabama.
I have no pilot experience, but as an optical engineer, an obvious solution is to have carefully shielded lights on the taxiways that illuminate the ground, but do not throw any light into the sky. Or at least pointed away from approaching aircraft. And have unshielded lights on the runway. That way, the runway is a row of very bright pinpoints of light, while the taxiway is an illuminated patch of ground without any obvious lights.
Why wouldn’t this work?
Runway and taxiway lights aren’t like streetlights. Streetlights actually light up the road surface. Runway and taxiway lights are so close to the ground that they don’t really cast any light on the surface you’re taxiing on; they just define where the edge of the pavement is at night, and they’re different colors (white for runways, blue for taxiways) to help tell things apart.
You could put airport lights up on posts like streetlights, but next to a runway that probably wouldn’t be a good idea.
Here’s a recent article on a related topic: runways and taxiways arranged so that it’s easy to get confused and inadvertently taxi onto or across a runway somebody else is using.
I once lined up and flew part of an approach to land on a taxiway. It’s not directly relevant to the OP because I was flying a Cessna 150 with an instructor in the right-hand seat and it was a visual approach in daylight. It was at Orlando Sanford which does have a center runway 27C, so my error wasn’t obvious to anyone except my instructor. Or so I thought.
Anyway, all of this pales in comparison with the airliner that lined up on approach to a hotel, mistaking it for runway 34 at Dublin Airport.
[Richard Dreyfus voice]I got that beat…[/Richard Dreyfus voice]
Back when I was working on my commercial I was flying solo at night in a Cherokee with no GPS. The plan was to do some landings at Stewart International in Newburgh, NY. KSWF is adjacent to the Hudson River and the longer runway is 9/27. I was coming from the west, and was cleared for a straight-in visual to 9.
I had the runway lights in sight a long way out and was mildly surprised when the tower asked me to confirm my position. Looked like around 3 miles out to me. I was then extremely surprised when the controller informed me I was over the field. The lights I was looking at were actually the Newburgh-Beacon Bridge which spans the Hudson on just about the same heading as the runway. It looked remarkably like the airport under those lighting conditions.
Really brain scrambling to have your reality rearranged that quickly in an airplane at night. Good thing the controller said something - no EZPass on my plane.
Yeah. Something not obvious to laymen is that airports are very dimly lit compared to cities and highways.
If you’re arriving at an airport that’s out in the boonies it’ll be the brightest thing around. If you’re arriving at an airport in the city or suburbs it’ll be that large black area in the sea of city lights. Only as you get pretty close will the comparatively dim color-coded lights of the airport’s details become obvious.
By design the various flavors of runway approach lights and vertical guidance lights don’t look quite like common city lights. But there’s still plenty of ways for a straight stretch of highway or bridge with whitish lights down both sides to look a lot like a runway from a few miles away. For damn sure the bridge will be brighter than the runway and hence visible from farther away.
Which is where the questioning attitude needs to stay with the pilot all the way from that initial “I *think *that’s *maaaybe *the airport kinda over there.” through to the final “I’ve seen enough details to be dead certain I’m about to land at the correct airport on the correct runway at the correct distance along it.”
There but for the Grace …