Category Archives for Airports.
Things got so bad yesterday that “the Port Authority shut down Terminals C and D to all traffic except Port Authority buses.” There were children walking down the highway, like refugees, hoping to escape the war zone for the airport.
Today? Things could even be worse.
The last planned strike was called off but London Heathrow workers were planning a strike for this Monday and Tuesday. Now they say Monday’s strike is off. As of now, though, Tuesday’s is still on.
Interesting research from Alexander Luttmann at UC Irvine suggests that slot controls don’t actually reduce delays at congested airports because large airlines at major airports “already internalize congestion” when planning their schedules.
That makes sense. Heavily congested airports take longer to get planes in and out. Flight times are longer. That means flights are more expensive — they take up more aircraft time and airlines have to pay their crews more, too.
While the busiest airports see plenty of flights, their largest airlines don’t just keep adding flights because that’s expensive, both for the new flights and for all of their existing flights which suffer greater delays and ultimately get longer flight times.
When you eat at an airport restaurant it may be a familiar brand you’re buying from but it’s usually not that restaurant’s company that’s making the food or serving it to you. Instead the ‘concept’ gets picked up by one of the big airport retailers like Delaware North or OTG.
You may be surprised by how much money these companies will pay a chef to write recipes for food that you’ll order by iPad.
If your flight does make it out there will be carry on bag restrictions and limited catering on many flights.
In a nationwide first, the San Francisco airport has banned the sale of single-use plastic water bottles effective August 20th.
Flavored waters are exempt from the rule, which applies to “restaurants, cafes and vending machines” throughout the airport.
An active duty military member returning from Kuwait wanted to keep a missile launcher as a souvenir, so packed it in his checked luggage. It was hard to miss when the luggage was screened.
United has entered into a partnership with CLEAR for expedited security screening. This is surprising because CLEAR is owned, in part, by Delta however United will be taking an equity stake as well. This will mean (1) expansion for CLEAR and (2) discounts for United elites and credit card customers.
It’s not people packing up and leaving Texas, heading back to California. It’s asylum seekers. They arrive over land, but once their asylum claims are processed they sometimes depart by air.
The punch list for the airport ballooned to 550,000 items. The original $2.6 billion project is now projected to cost $8.25 billion.
In the meantime the train station runs one ghost train a day “to keep the air moving.” The airport hotel has had staff for years “forlornly dusting rooms and turning on taps to keep the water supply moving.”
Gary Leff is one of the foremost experts in the field of miles, points, and frequent business travel -- a topic he has covered since 2002.
Co-founder of frequent flyer community InsideFlyer.com, emcee of the Freddie Awards, and named one of the "World's Top Travel Experts" by Conde' Nast Traveler (2010-Present) Gary has been a guest on most major news media, profiled in several top print publications, and published broadly on the topic of consumer loyalty. More About Gary »
