Close to a dozen airports around the country have applied for – and were planning to apply for –the TSA’s Screening Partnership Program (SPP), which allows airports to replace government screeners with those employed by TSA-approved private companies.  [See my story: Toss the TSA?]

16 airports, including those in San Francisco and Kansas City, are currently part of that SPP program and seem pretty happy with it. But last Friday TSA administrator John Pistole issued a memo saying he will not allow the program to expand.

“These airports will continue to be regulated by TSA and required to meet our high security standards,” Pistole said, “However, to preserve TSA as an effective, federal counterterrorism security network, SPP will not be expanded beyond the current 16 airports, unless a clear and substantial advantage to do so emerges in the future.”

TSA employees who feared losing their jobs to out-sourcing, are pleased with Pistole’s plan. But the decision doesn’t sit well with John Mica (R-Fla) who has been actively urging airports to “opt-out” of TSA-staffed screening. Mica just became chairman of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee and plans to launch an investigation into the matter.

Meanwhile, at Los Angeles International Airport, one of the airports considering the TSA ‘opt-out’ program, there was some good news about butterflies.

In addition to terminals and runways, there’s a 200-acre butterfly habitat at LAX designed to reintroduce and protect the coastal buckwheat plant, which is the only food the El Segundo Blue butterfly eats.

A seasonal field study and analysis of the butterfly was recently completed and it shows that, in 2010, the population of El Segundo Blue butterflies was somewhere between 111,000 and 116,000; and increase of about 30% over 2009.

Categories: TSA
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During a few jam-packed days in Indianapolis this week, I got a crash-course in racing from Donald Davidson, the historian at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway Hall of Fame Museum

The collection of winning cars on display in the museum is quite thrilling and as part of this year’s centennial celebration of the Indianapolis 500, fans are being asked to help choose the greatest 33 drivers of the race’s first 100 years.

While in town, I also got schooled on mead – which is wine made from honey – during a fun tasting with Brett Canaday who, with his wife Tia Agnew, operates New Day Meadery, Indiana’s first and only meadery. (If you go, be sure to taste the mead made from blueberries)

And, of course, I spent a few hours poking around Indianapolis International Airport in search of souvenirs to share with you on Souvenir Sunday, a day that celebrates the fun, inexpensive and local items for sale at airports.

IND doesn’t disappoint.

After I tore myself away from Just Pop In, a store that sells  popcorn with unusual flavors,

I found some fun Indy 500 race souvenirs

Do you shop for fun stuff when you’re stuck at the airport?  If you find something that’s inexpensive (around $10), “of” the city or region and, ideally, a bit offbeat, please snap a photo and send it along.

If your souvenir is featured on Souvenir Sunday here at StuckatTheAirport.com, I’ll send you a special airport souvenir.

Categories: Airport shops, Events, Exhibits, Food, History, Museums, Shopping, Souvenir Sunday, Souvenirs
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The Chinese New Year (often referred to as Lunar New Year) falls on February 3^rd this year and will be welcomed in Asian communities worldwide with two weeks of food, firecrackers, parades, lion and dragon dances and other events designed to sweep away the old year and welcome in a new one filled with good fortune.

Chinese zodiac-wise, 2011 is the Year of the Rabbit, and those born under this sign are said to be ambitious and lucky. That’s why guests visiting the elaborate garden display at the Bellagio hotel in Las Vegas will be greeted with an 18 foot tall God of Prosperity and a 12-foot tall hare with a coat made from 4500 plants. “We provide our guests with a wow factor at every point of contact,” said Andres Garcia, the hotel’s executive director of horticulture. “That includes making sure the display reflects the authenticity of Chinese legend and, in this case, longevity and good fortune for the Year of the Rabbit.”

Not heading to Vegas? You’ll find Chinese New Year celebrations in Beijing, Vancouver, Washington, D.C. and in Singapore’s Changi Airport, where festivities will include food sampling, plate spinning, fortune telling and a roving God of Fortune.

You’ll can also celebrate Chinese New Year in these lucky cities:

Seattle is among the cities that will begin its celebration of the Lunar Year on the weekend before February 3, to allow as many people as possible to participate in cultural activities, a food walk and entertainment that includes Lion and Dragon dances, Taiko drumming, martial arts and the community’s 2^nd annual Children’s Parade contest.

Because 2011 is the Year of the Rabbit, “Children are invited to enter their pet rabbits in a contest for Rabbit of the Year,” said Youlee Wang of the Chinatown-International District Business Improvement Area. Thankfully, no such contest was held in 2010, during the Year of the Tiger. More details here.

San Francisco’s Chinese New Year celebrations also begin this weekend with a ribbon cutting and Flower Fair filled with candy, fresh fruit, blooming flowers and other supplies with symbolic meaning for a new year. Entertainment will include traditional lion dancing, Chinese opera and martial arts demonstrations. Events continue through February 19^th, when the world-famous grand illuminated Chinese New Year Parade will roll out with extravagant floats, lion dancers, more than 100 marching bands and school groups, Chinese acrobats, plenty of firecrackers and a 250-foot dragon that must be carried by more than 100 people.  More details.

Bonus: Anyone born in the Year of the Hare (1927, 1939, 1951, 1963, 1975, 1987, 1999 and 2011) gets free admission to Lunar New Year festivities at the San Francisco Zoo on February 13^th.

In New York City, a Firecracker Ceremony to ward off evil spirits and a festival filled with cultural performances and dances will take place on February 3^rd in Manhattan’s Chinatown neighborhood.  Floats, acrobats, performers, marching bands and lion and dragon dancers will take part in the annual Lunar New Year Festival and Parade on February 6^th.  More details.  And for the next few weeks, Chinese New Year events at the Museum of Chinese in America will include walking tours, lectures, special exhibits and a Lunar New Year Festival Family Day.

In Honolulu, there will be a Chinese New Year Celebration with ethnic foods, martial arts demonstrations and entertainment in the Chinatown Cultural Plaza beginning on Saturday afternoon January 29th. The day ends with a parade that starts at the Hawaii State Capitol and includes various Narcissus Festival Queens and their courts, cultural organizations, lion and dragon dance associations and a 150-foot long dragon. An evening block party will continue the festivities with two stages of live music, more cultural performances and plenty of firecrackers. More details.

In Sydney, Australia, the Chinese New Year celebration kicks off Friday, January 28^th with the opening of New Year Markets featuring crafts and martial arts demonstrations, a karaoke competition and visits from dancing lions and dragons. The festival continues with Dragon Boat races and cultural events leading up to a spectacular Twilight Parade on February 6^th that ends with a huge fireworks show in Darling Harbor. More details.

Bonus: China’s Hubei province is sending a 250-member troupe to Sydney with floats, hip-hop artists, dragons and performers who will demonstrate Wudang martial arts (made famous by the film Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon) and the traditional Tujia Waving Hand Dance.

Flower markets offering auspicious blooms and plants for the New Year kick off Hong Kong’s Chines New Year celebration on January 28th. The city’s Chinese New Year Night Parade will take place on February 3^rd, with more than a dozen illuminated floats, performers from around the world (including cheerleaders and a choir from the U.S.), marching bands, street performers and traditional dragon and lion dancers. A spectacular fireworks display takes place February 4^th over Victoria Harbor. More details.

Those born in the Year of the Rabbit are said to be articulate, ambitious and lucky. So what better place to ring in the Chinese New Year than in Las Vegas? Through March 5^th, the Bellagio’s Conservatory & Botanical Gardens is displaying a symbolic and, of course, over the top Lunar New Year garden that includes a 35-foot Chinese Junk Boat with a 38-foot mast, a Ming Dynasty-styled gazebo and a 12-foot tall rabbit made with more than 4,500 live plants. Eight baby rabbits (so far), each made of 500 live plants, are in the garden as well.

The Bellagio installation also includes oversized red-for-good-luck silk Chines lanterns, an 18-foot-tall Chinese God of Prosperity and seven replica Terracotta Warriors covered in crushed walnuts and ground carrot seeds. Lucky for you, the exhibit is free and open 24 hours a day.

[My Celebrating the Year of the Rabbit story appears in a slightly different version on msnbc.com]

Categories: Entertainment, Events, Holidays
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A few fresh amenities you can enjoy at some airports – and on some Amtrak trains.

At Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport, celebrity chef Rick Bayless has opened Tortas Frontera, in Terminal 1.  The menu includes Mexican sandwiches, tortas, a guacamole bar and a wide variety of other tasty dishes.  (Another branch will open soon in Terminal 3).

Today Amtrak announced that there’s now free Wi-Fi on the Cascades route between Eugene, OR and Vancouver, B.C.

And with the opening of a branch of the Saxon Pub (an iconic music venue in Austin), there are now five venues that offer live music at Austin Bergstrom International Airport for a total of 13 shows each week.

Saxon Pub ribbon cutting ceremony, photo by Carlton Wade

Categories: Airport shops, Bars, Food, free Wi-Fi, Music, Wi-Fi
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Southern Utah recently celebrated the opening of the $159 million St. George Municipal Airport, which replaces an airport one fifth the size.

From the outside, the airport looks lovely.

(Photo by Dave Becker)

But what’s inside?

Complimentary Wi-Fi, two empty space awaiting restaurants, painted tiles of scenes in St. George history and a mural by Greg Abbott, a bronze sculpture by L’Deane Trueblood and a painting of Zion on loan from Zion Nation Park.

L’Deane Trueblood during installation of “Vicki Van Meter” sculpture. Van Meter, who committed suicide in 2008, became famous in the early 1990s for being the youngest pilot to fly across the United States. Photo by Dave Becker

Categories: Airports, Art
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