Category Archives for Airports.
iBorderCtrl is a new lie detector project being tested in European airports at immigration checkpoints in Hungary, Latvia and Greece. They all border countries outside the EU.
Passengers entering from outside the EU will be asked questions “by a virtual border guard avatar.” A computer will decide whether it thinks the passenger is lying, and if so the tone of voice of the electronic border official should get “more skeptical.”
I don’t know about you but on a flight less than four hours I may not use the lavatory, especially if I’m in a window seat. I’ll just make a stop in the restroom on the way out of the terminal.
That doesn’t always work if you’re flying into New York JFK, though. This morning in terminal 5 a water main break caused the airports to lose pressure and close down the bathrooms.
Yesterday’s 7:05 p.m. American Airlines flight AA257 from Miami to Mexico City was delayed multiple times and then cancelled due to a security threat that was ultimately deemed ‘non-credible’.
When customers were back in the terminal they were guarded by armed officers. Police searched passengers’ phones and swabbed them for explosives residue.
There will be more airline capacity flying out of Beijing this quarter than the traditional ‘world’s busiest airport’ Atlanta.
Five of the top 10 airports are in Asia, one is in Europe and one in the Mideast. Three are in the U.S.
I’ve taken medicine with me all over the world. I take a pill for allergies, and I have over the counter pain relief in my travel bag. I’ve never had a problem, although of course carrying medicine can run afoul of local laws. Not everything that’s legal in the United States is legal elsewhere.
The United Arab Emirates though has a new requirement that you submit the medications you’llbe bringing into the country for approval in advance.
When checking in with bags, airlines used to ask two questions: Did you pack these bags yourself? Have they been outside of your possession?
The questions were routinely mocked. They never caught a terrorist. Little did I know they were actually important to uncover rogue mothers packing bags on behalf of their adults sons.
A Customs and Border Protection beagle ‘alarmed’ at the luggage of an Ecuadorian traveler entering the U.S. through the Atlanta airport on Thursday and found a whole roast pig in their luggage.
It was spotted by a 6 year old beagle named Hardy, who thought the bag smelled delicious. But he wasn’t allowed to eat it.
In writing about New York’s $13 billion plan to renovate New York JFK airport I pointed out that the redesign wasn’t about serving the passenger, it’s about serving investors.
Airports aren’t being designed with passengers as the focus, they’re being designed with selling to passengers as the focus.
Security staff in India are being told to smile less. They’re worried about the perception of lax security, in other words security theater, although the agency’s director seems to believe that good security treats passengers poorly.
We’d be much better off with airports that efficiently moved people from their initial location to their gate, and on arrival to their final destination, than with sprawling complexes that are cumbersome to traverse but accommodate more retail.
You can only sell off the airport’s future income stream once. Investing the money is new mega-terminals means not investing the money in things that would actually improve the airport most. As a result these choices mean the New York JFK travel experience will be worse than it otherwise could be.
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 »
