As part of its Liberty Weekend festivities, the Orlando International Airport (MCO) will present a free concert by the Orlando Philharmonic Orchestra. The concert will take place at 8 pm, on Saturday June 26, 2010 in the atrium of the Hyatt Regency Hotel, which doubles as the public lobby area for gates 60 to 129.  All attendees will get three hours of complimentary airport parking.

Saturday June 26^th and Sunday June 27th, from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. each day, unticketed visitors are invited into Silicon Valley’s Mineta San Jose International Airport (SJC) for a sneak peek at the new high-tech Terminal B.  The new building includes seating areas with built-in power ports and public art that includes German multi-media artist’s Bjoern Schuelke’s Space Observer, an interactive, two-story tall robot-like structure with three legs and propeller-equipped arms.

(Watch a Space Observer movie.)

Registered visitors will be able to walk through the terminal, see the art, buy a souvenir and enter drawings for prizes that will include airline tickets and travel packages.

If you plan on visiting the terminal, you’ll need to register in advance on the SJC website by Wednesday, June 23^rd and pick the day and time you want to stop by.

In the meantime, here’s a link to a great photo slide show of the San Jose Airport through the years from The Mercury News.

Here’s great news for anyone who finds themselves stuck at Los Angeles International Airport (LAX) on the weekend.

The Observation Deck at the top of the Theme Building, which has been closed since 9/11, will finally re-open to the public this Saturday.

(A view of the old version of the observation deck; courtesy LAX. New version: under wraps!)

There will be a formal ribbon-cutting ceremony on Monday morning (June 21, 2010) but the official public hours of the deck will be Saturday and Sunday from 8 a.m. until 5 p.m. Go take a look through the new telescopes and enjoy the view!

Orlando Airport getting Google-ized?

According to this story in the Orlando Sentinel, the Orlando International Airport (MCO) is in discussion with Google for a two-year deal in which Google would pay the airport more than $100,000 a year to sponsor the existing (free) airport Wi-Fi and provide a variety of other amenities, including free Internet kiosks for passengers traveling without laptops and phone booths at the international gates offering free long distance calling.

Sounds like Google is talking to other airports about this same sort of ‘experiment,’ but no word yet on where.

And this sounds like fun:

(courtesy Hot Rod)

This Saturday (June 19^th, 2010) Kansas City International Airport will be hosting its fourth KCI Cruise. Not a sailing ship cruise, but the sort of cruise where hundreds – in this case up to 500 – owners of classic, muscle and special-interest automobiles gather in a parking lot to show off their cool cars.

The event runs from 3 p.m. until 8 p.m. (weather permitting; wouldn’t want anything to happen to those cars!) and money raised from the sales of donated food and prizes will go to area charities. The prizes are nothing to sneeze at. They’ll be giving away Frontier Airlines tickets, Chiefs and Royals tickets, Justin Bieber concert tickets (!), hotel stays and more. For more details and for directions to the event, see the KCI Cruise page on the Kansas City International Airport website.

Today the folks at John Wayne International Airport (SNA) in Orange County, California announced a partnership with FreeFi Networks to provide free wireless internet access at the airport.

You’ll need need to watch a short commercial before getting to that free Wi-Fi service, but that’s a small price to pay for a service most of us would rather not be without when we’re stuck at the airport.  Thanks, SNA!

And there are several new art exhibits at a few airports around the country:

At Miami International Airport (MIA), photos by architect and award-winning photographer James Palma are on display in the mia Central Terminal Gallery, just past the security checkpoint on Concourse E. The 20 photographs in the exhibition were winners chosen by the National American Institute of Architects over 10 years.

At Austin Bergstrom International Airport (AUS), a new art exhibit up through August 12, 2010 explores the theme of twilight with works from the Multicultural Artists Partnership of Austin. One nice example is Kay Hughes’ “View with Song Bird.”

And the summer installment of the art showcase at Nashville International Airport (BNA) has opened, with works by more than a half dozen local artists, including Pieces from the Past by Mike Andrews

And quilts by the The Zuri Quilting Guild of Nashville, Tennesse.

Photo courtesy Craig Murphy, via Flickr

OK, so Iceland, and pretty much everyplace else in Europe, is out.

But if I could fly anywhere in the United States this weekend, I’d choose Denver.

There’s no volcano erupting there, but this weekend the city is hosting Doors Open Denver – a free event that offers a look inside dozens of buildings around town that are usually closed to the public.  My column on msnbc.com this week, Welcome! The Door is open, includes a run-down of half a dozen cities that host this sort of event, but here’s a preview, along with some photos that didn’t make it into the posted story.

(Photo by Gregory Thow)

Billed as a celebration of the city’s built environment and design, the 6^th annual Doors Open Denver takes place April 17-18 and includes 80 to 90 buildings around town that are usually off-limits to the public. This year’s theme is adaptive re-use so you’ll get to see many old buildings being used in creative new ways.

This year, participating sites include the city’s old main post office, which has been turned into a high-security federal courthouse; a restored mansion that serves as the Colorado Governor’s Residence; a theater in a former mortuary; a Yellow Cab garage that now houses businesses and residential units; and the Historic Sugar Building, which was built in 1906 as the headquarters for the Great Western Sugar Company and now houses office and retail space, and two original Otis cage elevators.

One sure-to-be-popular site is the Daniels & Fisher Tower, which was once the tallest building in Denver. The Italian Renaissance Tower has a restored lobby with marble floors and walls and a 17^th floor boasting a giant clock-face and a balcony that offers great 360-degree views of the city, the surrounding plains and the mountains.

(Courtesy: Gregory Thow)

More doors opened
If you can’t make it to Denver this weekend, don’t worry. Doors at many other usually off-limits locations will soon be opening in cities throughout North America, including Toronto, New York, Chicago, and in Lowell, Mass.

May 13-15 are the dates for the 9^th annual Doors Open Lowell event, which will feature everything from reclaimed and restored mill buildings to a 1920’s classical revival Masonic Temple with curious chambers and meeting rooms, and the subterranean space that once housed giant turbines for a power plant that ran a local mill.

During Doors Open Toronto, held on May 29-30, 150 buildings of architectural, historic, cultural and/or social significance will be open to the public. Highlights include: Toronto’s City Hall, which offers self-guided tours of the Rotunda, the Council Chambers and the Observation Deck, and the five-story red brick Toronto Flatiron Building, which pre-dates New York City’s famous Flatiron building by about ten years. Also open to the public will be the Canada Life building, which has a weather beacon and a 17^th floor tower room offering a panoramic view of downtown Toronto and Lake Ontario, as well as the restored circa-1920 Canon Theater — once the largest and most elegant vaudeville and motion picture palace in Canada.

Mark your calendars: New York hosts Open House New York on Oct. 9-10, with more than 200 sites participating throughout all five city boroughs, including the Woolworth Building, Radio City Music Hall and the Atlantic Avenue Tunnel, which is accessed not by a door, but by a manhole.

(Courtesy Jeffrey Donenfeld)

So I’m fortunate to be able to produce radio features and write books about my discoveries. More than two hundred of my favorite offbeat attractions in Oregon are in the newly updated Oregon Curiosities book you see pictured in the craftily-titled Buy My Books section here on this site. There are an equal number of unusual people, places and things in the Washington Curiosities book I’m starting to update right now.

One of the aviation-related places in the Oregon Curiosities book is The Bomber Restaurant complex in Milwaukie, about six miles south of Portland.

From 1947 until 1991 this vintage World War II B-17G four-engine bomber served as shelter for a forty-pump independent gas station that was one of the top performers in the country. When the gas station closed, the bomber fell on hard times and for years the plane was just a sad-looking roadside attraction suffering from bird poop, vandalism, and Oregon’s rainy climate.

Now restoration of the bomber is under way. Her nose is all shiny and new and on display inside the on-site WWII-themed Wings of Freedom Showcase. And while the gas station is long gone, you can fill up your stomach at the memorabilia-packed Bomber Restaurant, where the menu includes Bomblettes (omelettes) and Bombarded Hash Browns for breakfast, and Tokyo Rose BLTs and Bomberburgers for lunch and dinner.

If you want to see The Bomber for yourself, be sure to enter the Oregon Mt. Hood Territory’s Secret Sweet Spots contest. Each week you’ll be asked to answer a (very easy) question about a “hidden gem” in the region. You’ll find the answers in the short videos on the Mt. Hood Territory website.

Of course, one of those Secret Sweet Spots is The Bomber.

(Photo courtesy Jacksonsville International Airport )

On Tuesday (February 16, 2010) Philadelphia International Airport (PHL) had a ribbon-cutting ceremony for its new Terminal E expansion, which includes seven gates for Southwest Airlines and several new food and retail outlets, including a news/gift shop, a McDonalds, and a sit-down restaurant called Cantina Laredo.  The new expansion also brings new artwork to the airport, courtesy of Philadelphia’s Percent for Art Program. Look for Cloudsphere, by Philadelphia artist Mei-ling Hom in the rotunda.

(Photo courtesy Philadelphia International Airport )

And congratulations to Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport (ATL): it’s Paper Runway exhibit of wearable paper clothing and accessories made with everything from banana leaf fibers to recycled cotton rags and coffee filters, won an award from the Georgia Association of Museums and Galleries.

Look for “Paper Runway” in the cases in the walkway connecting the main security area and Concourse T.  But hurry: the exhibit will only be there through March.

I really like those kooky lounges. Riding on them always offers a unique view of the airport.  And there’s a black and white picture somewhere in the airport’s archives that explains the “lounge” part perfectly: it shows females attendants serving drinks to passengers on their way to the plane.

Even this photo shows travelers who seem to have no worries at all about making their connecting flights.

There are certainly some upsides to the AeroTrain.

One benefit is that right now there’s a photography exhibit in the tunnel connecting the temporary Concourse C with the C-Gates AeroTrain station.

(Photo by: Kanji Takeno)

The exhibit “Washington, DC: Through Our Eyes,” includes photos shot by members of the White House News Photographers Association. The 44 photos currently on display are just the first group of more than 200 photos that will be displayed on a rotating basis.

And,  if you find yourself with a long layover at Dulles International Airport (IAD) and have wrung all the excitement out of riding the AeroTrain and looking at the photo exhibit, then check out the cool stuff at the National Air and Space Museum Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center just down the road.

The museum is big enough for the to Smithsonian to display thousands of aviation and space artifacts that just won’t fit on the National Mall.  Like the Boeing B-29 Superfortress  “Enola Gay.”

New York’s Albany International Airport (ALB) may be unique among airports in having a gallery space open to the public and an on-site curator who is also an artist.  So it’s always a treat when a new exhibition kicks off.

The newest one, Material Witness, is no exception.

(Model City, 2009, Assorted study models, cardboard, paper, plastic, metal, glue, tape)

Produced in cooperation with the nearby Rensselaer Schools of Architecture, and Humanities, Arts and Social Sciences, the exhibit includes drawings, photographs, study models and site-specific constructions, including floor-to-ceiling “trash walls” that reflect the possibilities found in discarded or recycled materials.

(Trash Walls, (detail), 2009, found material constructions)

Material Witness is in the Albany International Airport Gallery, pre-security on the third floor of the terminal through June 20, 2010.

That column, which posts Thursday, January 14^th, 2010, focuses on some of the privacy issues surrounding the “virtual strip search” aspect of these machines.

I didn’t have room for in the story for the comments of airport terminal planner and designer, Pat Askew, from Perkins+Will.

We don’t think of it right away, but Askew points out that these big, expensive body scanner machines will not only change the TSA procedures, but also have an impact on the look and layout of present – and future – airport terminals.

Askew says:

• Body scanning machines take more space, especially width-wise, than do the current magnetometers (or walk-through metal detectors).  It’s already hard to find space in existing terminals for all the necessary equipment they needs to be there;
• Processing rates are greater with body scanners than with metal detectors. This means longer lines, more machines – and more required space;
• Explosive detection devices for carry-ons will soon be required. This equipment will be smaller, but similar to the technology currently used for checked luggage. It will replace the current x-ray machines used to examine carry-ons and operate in much the same way, but may be larger and slower….and need more space.

So next time you’re Stuck at the Airport, take a good look around. That great piece of public art in the terminal may soon need to make way for a hulking piece of security equipment.

Like, say, Auckland Airport. Check out what greets visitors arriving on international flights:

No one is going to mistake this for an airport in Omaha, now are they?

And here’s another nice touch:  volunteers at the Auckland airport greet every international flight with complimentary coffee, tea, and travel information.