shuttle driver makes me miss my flight

[taxguykarl]

Fortunately I've never had to go through O'Hare.

It's always my final destination or departure point... and I've never had a single problem with it. Might be because I generally only fly on the puddle-jumpers that handle the routine commuter flights, though.

Same here. As I live in that neck of the woods. I would hate to have to catch a connector, here though.

Ihave to admit......I like O'Hare. Yes it is freakin' huge, but i've flown to, or through O'Hare 30-40 times. The airport that to me is the biggest PITA is Atlanta.

You want a a real PITA airport try Lambert (St. Louis). Has there ever been a time when Lambert was not under construction?

I like McCarran (Las Vegas) and Sky Harbor (Phoenix), the later being my favorite large airport.

[Kogarashi]

Murphy's Law of Gate Distances (where the shorter the layover, the further away the connecting gate) doesn't really work in Albany International (NY) or White Plains (NY).

Hubby and I flew to visit my parents one holiday. Our plane landed at the furthest gate on the concourse. We started trekking through the concourse to get to the baggage area so we could meet up with my parents. About five minutes (and as many gates) later, we had to do an abrupt about-face as we had just walked past the security area which led to the baggage claim. My parents were laughing. We were just so used to larger airports (SLC and Dallas/Fort Worth) that we weren't really thinking about how much smaller Albany was.

Last year in August, Hubby and I were flying to Florida out of White Plains to spend a few days with his parents at a condo. We got through the security checkpoint, and right there was the waiting area for the airport's three gates (yes, only three). You could walk from one end of the concourse to the other in a minute or two. One vending machine for snacks, and maybe a kiosk for books. That's it. Threw us for a loop.

DFW would swallow White Plains whole and probably go eat Albany for dessert.

[tollbaby]

*blush* I LOOOOVE O'Hare. I hate Detroit, but I LOOOOOOOOVE O'Hare LOL Never had a problem there. Everywhere else though? .... *sigh* Worst airport in the world? Trudeau in Montreal.

[Chromatix]

Speaking of small airports, Tampere is about as small as they get - for an international. A couple of the budget airlines fly in there in preference to Helsinki-Vantaa.

The check-in system consists of a standalone X-ray machine, and the passengers are directed to put their scanned and tagged luggage on the single, straight conveyor belt. Crude but surprisingly efficient. The security checkpoints are made of chipboard, except for the metal detecting and X-ray machines.

There are no shops on the public side of security. You arrive, check in, and go through security immediately. On the secure side, there is a cafe, a gift shop and a waiting area. The whole lot is just big enough to comfortably hold a 737's worth of passengers.

On the arrivals side, there's just a serpentine queue, and a door which is locked behind the last passenger so they can prep the plane. At the head of the queue is the passport checkpoint. After that, it's just the business end of another straight conveyor belt from which the bags are offloaded onto the floor. And a couple of small shops and public telephones for taxis.

This is an international airport!

[nomorecarts]

my local airport has 6 gates, but they very rarely have more than 3 planes there

it takes longer to get through the line at the grocery store than through airport security here, and that's not necessarily saying anything bad about the lines at our grocery stores

[RootedPhoenix]

DFW would swallow White Plains whole and probably go eat Albany for dessert.

I'm not sure what meal Sacramento International would be for DFW (a hearty lunch, perhaps?). It's not tiny, but is probably a tenth of the behemoth DFW is.

Security is fantastically smooth sailing even right near Christmas Day. I love it.

LAX though? Security's okay, but it's HUGE, and finding your gate is a gigantic pain.

[JustADude]

I hate Detroit, but I LOOOOOOOOVE O'Hare.

Um... Tollbaby... I've always been under the impression that O'Hare was in Chicago... or were you saying you hate the Detroit airport?

[Kogarashi]

LAX though? Security's okay, but it's HUGE, and finding your gate is a gigantic pain.

Unless you're flying to/from Hawaii. Then your gates are all pretty much at one end of one terminal. (Which, admittedly, still has a good ten gates on it. But it's all fairly close-packed.)

[nomorecarts]

I went through Sea-Tac with my grandmother once, so of course we landed at the last gate in one concourse and left the last gate in another. we did stop at the food court, Sea-Tac has a kick ass food court. better than O'Hare, but that's not hard

[Dreamstalker]

Last Christmas, Kennedy Airport was the site of a cascade of fail that started in Boston (flight was delayed due to weather; everyone connecting on the 7 PM American flight out of Kennedy was told by an agent that we would have time to make our connection...guess what, nobody did). By some extreme stroke of luck I was able to get on an afternoon flight the next day (few hours bouncing around the airport the next day, but at least I was there). AA managed to book me into a hotel that was closed for renovations but the hotel-shuttle wrangler was able to get me a decent room close to the airport for an emergency rate (probably the last one in the city on December 22nd).

Rapid City Regional Airport is...interesting. Two gates, I think. And as I found out the year I missed my scheduled morning flight by a hair, there are only two flights per day and bupkis in the terminal area. That may have changed as the last time I was out that way was in 1997.

I don't mind long layovers in Denver; plenty of stuff to browse and I find the airport as a whole fairly easy to navigate.

DFW is okay if your connecting terminals are relatively close. The tram is fun.

[otakuneko]

I have a friend who's a fleet service clerk (ie: bag-thrower) for AA at DFW. (You don't want to know what happens to luggage marked 'fragile', or anything with the Apple logo proudly displayed. )

My granddad also used to work as a pre-boarding screener (pre-9/11 and TSA, one day I went to work with him, spent the whole day riding the tram and reading an unfortunately very boring book) and also for Super Shuttle there. That shuttle driver who had to pull over to look at his map? He'da been canned the very moment he returned to the airport, had he been working for Super Shuttle and they found out about it. Super Shuttle was (and probably still is) extremely strict on their drivers, and practically any mistake, even once, could get you fired.

[smileyeagle1021]

. Super Shuttle was (and probably still is) extremely strict on their drivers, and practically any mistake, even once, could get you fired.

sounds a lot like Cache Valley Limo... they are very strict... they're drivers are very good though... and at $80 round trip from Logan UT to SLC International Airport they're a pretty good deal too (that's door to door service and the shuttle driver loads and unloads all the luggage)

[Jetfire]

Speaking of small airports, Tampere is about as small as they get - for an international. A couple of the budget airlines fly in there in preference to Helsinki-Vantaa.


This is an international airport!

Nah, a lot of Canadian airports are technically Internationals, since they have flights to the US, including Fredericton New Brunswick's airport.

It has room for 3 airlines, but IIRC only 1.5 are used (Air Canada/Jazz, and a seasonal flight to London). When you checkin, your luggage is weighed and tagged, then you hve to carry it yourself to the XRay machine where it's scanned.

It has 1 restaurant, which is outside the secured zone. Technically it has 3 gates, but only 2 waiting areas, entered via a single entrance with 2 metal detectors.

No jetways at all, it's all stairs and walking out to the tarmac to board/disembark your plane.

For national flights, you walk right into the baggage claim area (which is also where the public waits for people.

For international flights arrival, you enter a room beside the baggage claim room to go through customs, and IIRC you can claim your bags there and walk out to the above baggage claim area.

I think it averages about 4-6 scheduled flights a day (Toronto, Halifax, Ottawa and Montreal; they're trying to get a US flight back).