Airports

Celebrate Cinco de Mayo at the airport

Airports, Holidays,

On Thursday, May 3, 2012 between 10:30am – 12:30pm, San Diego International Airport (SAN) will host a Cinco de Mayo performance by Ballet Folklórico de Chula Vista in the Terminal 2 West baggage claim area.

The show is part of the airport’s ongoing performing arts series.

Cinco de Mayo is also being noted at New York’s LaGuardia Airport. The Food & Shops
in the Central Terminal will be offering some special deals on food and drinks.

Participating outlets include MexiJoe’s Grill, in the center food court, Figs and Jet Rock.

Know of other airports celebrating Cinco de Mayo? Let me know.

Louisville International Airport ready for Kentucky Derby

Airports, Events,

The Kentucky Derby is coming up on Saturday, May 5th and this whole week is the busiest time of the year for Louisville International Airport, SDF.

To make all those horse racing fans feel welcome, the airport decorates the terminal with approximately 2,000 roses and hires musicians to play in the rotunda.

Better yet: volunteers greet arriving passengers with Woodford Reserve bourbon balls.

From the photos airport officials sent me, it looks like everyone – even the airline staff – gets into the race-day spirit.

Be sure to swing back here on Sunday when our Souvenir Sunday feature will share some of the Derby-related souvenirs race fans can pick up at Louisville International Airport.

All photos courtesy of the airport.

Souvenir Sunday at Dubai International Airport

Airports, Shopping, Souvenir Sunday, Souvenirs, ,

It’s Souvenir Sunday – a day to take a look some fun and inexpensive items you can purchase when you’re stuck at the airport.

This week’s finds come from Dubai International Airport , which is known for offering the world’s largest duty free operation.

Gold is a big draw at this airport and each year Dubai Duty Free racks up gold sales of more than $120 million.

No souvenirs made of gold fit into my Souvenir Sunday guidelines of “fun, inexpensive and ‘of’ the city or region,” so I headed for the gift shops offering more affordable items, such as hookahs, wooden camels and sand.

More airport murals

Airports, Art, ,

My previous post shared some of the significant murals that have been saved and restored by airports that I included in my recent “At the Airport” column on USATODAY.com.

Here are more murals.

Cincinnati

In Cincinnati, Ohio in 1974 a portion of the city’s Union Railway Terminal was to be demolished, fourteen 20 foot by 20 foot Art Deco mosaic tile and painted stucco murals made by Winhold Reiss in the early 1930s were moved to the Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky Airport, CVG.

The murals portray a wide range of local industrial history and have become a local tourist attraction. “We give around 150 tours a year for approximately 2,500 people,” said airport spokesperson Molly Flanagan, “and the murals are major part of that.”

In addition to the murals at CVG, the Art Deco-style terminal at Cincinnati’s Lunken Airport is home to two large oil-on-canvas paintings, created by William H. Gothard in 1937. “While today it is a general aviation airport, Lunken was at one time the largest commercial airport in the United States,” said Betsey Sanpere, creator of the Facebook page Arts in the Airports.

Tampa

Tampa International Airport has also rescued and restored the WPA-era murals now showcased on the airside of Terminal E.

In the late 1930’s, local artist George Snow Hill created seven murals depicting the history of flight for what was then Tampa’s newly built Peter O. Knight Airport. When a new terminal was built, in 1971, the murals went along, but most ended up rolled up and improperly stored away.

A triptych showing the first scheduled airline flight in history and the panel about the Wright Brothers were displayed at the airport’s executive suite, but the murals showing contributions made by Icarus and Daedalus, Archimedes, The Montgolfier Brothers, Otto Lilienthal and Tony Jannus were getting ruined in storage.

A major mural restoration project was linked to the construction of Tampa Airport’s Terminal E and, according to airport spokesperson Brenda Geoghagan, the post-security concourse area was designed to accommodate all seven murals.

More murals

These aren’t the only airports with murals that needed to be saved. The Marine Terminal at New York’s LaGuardia Airport is home to “Flight,” a Works Project Administration mural painted in 1939-42 by James Brooks that tells the story of human flight beginning with Greek mythology on through to the mid-20th century. 12 feet high and 235 feet long, is it supposedly the largest WPA mural ever attempted. The mural was painted over in 1952, but uncovered, restored and named a city landmark in 1980.

And Sanpere, of Arts in Airports, is monitoring the six, ten-foot by ten-foot, colorful, transit-themed murals by Xavier Gonzalez currently behind protective walls at the art-deco terminal at Lakefront Airport on Lake Pontchartrain in New Orleans. “The terminal is being accurately restored to its prior pre-Hurricane Katrina status and the entire city is waiting to see these paintings, which have been covered for decades,” said Sanpere.

While some murals need to be saved so the public can view them, at least one airport mural was created to save a view.

As part of a $35 million runway safety area improvement project completed in 2005, Lexington’s Blue Grass Airport had to relocate a creek and a roadway and construct a large embankment and a 30 foot by 800 foot retaining wall.

Rather than leave the wall blank and mar the view, the airport commissioned Eric Henn to paint a trompe l’oeil mural depicting a stone bridge, a federal style house and images from Kentucky horse farms.

The mural is so realistic-looking that “as an extra safety precaution we do publish information about the mural in publications typically accessed by visiting pilots,” said airport spokesperson Amy Caudill.

Unusual airport amenities: valets for fish and wedding dresses

Airports

As airport amenities go, these may not be the sort of services you’ll use often – or ever – but there are pretty cool: at the Fairmont Vancouver Airport – which is located inside the Vancouver International Airport – there’s a fish valet who makes sure halibut, salmon and other sea creatures stay safely chilled while a fisherman is making a stopover.

The airport also has a wedding dress valet. Brides staying at the hotel before jetting off on their honeymoon can leave their wedding gown at the hotel and pick it up when they fly home.



(Photo courtesy UW digital collection, via Flickr)

DFW airport adds yoga room

Airports, Health, ,

Do we detect a trend?

A few weeks back the first in-airport airport yoga room opened at San Francisco International Airport. Now comes word that there’s a yoga space at Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport.

Located behind a partial privacy screen, DFW’s free yoga studio is located in Terminal D at Gate D40 and is equipped with yoga mats, hand sanitizer and a view.

The studio was installed in connection with the DFW “LiveWell” Walking Path and is a few feet from the start/end point of the Terminal D walking path that was also unveiled on Wednesday April 4.

Gardening at Chicago’s O’Hare and Midway Airports

Airports, Exhibits, , ,

A Green Gardens exhibit is on view at O’Hare and Midway International Airports through Monday, April 9 that “re-purposes” some of the floral displays that were on view at the Chicago Flower and Garden Show held at Chicago’s Navy Pier in March.


A series of window façade replicas with window box floral displays from Chicagoland nonprofits, are featured at both airports and, at O’Hare, there’s a replica of the White House Kitchen Garden, with raised beds to show off the ideas of growing fresh, organic, local food that are part of the First Lady Michelle Obama’s childhood anti-obesity initiative.

Vertical hydroponic gardens, which demonstrate how vertical gardens can provide compact and efficient growing space, reduce noise and improve indoor air quality, are on display at both airports.

At Midway, the Green Gardens exhibit is located on the upper level ticketing area. At O’Hare, the exhibit is in Terminal 2, post-security, next to the Kids on the Fly children’s play area, and in Terminal 3, between Concourses H/K and L, post-security.

Photos courtesy: Chicago Department of Aviation (CDA)/kp

Airports go dark for Earth Hour

Airports, Events, , ,

It’s time once again for Earth Hour, an annual event in which thousands of cities, towns, homes, hotels and landmarks around the world turn off their lights for an hour, at 8:30 p.m. local time, to make a statement about climate change.

Even if you’re not into the “lights out” movement, the idea that places as diverse as casinos on the Las Vegas Strip, the John Hancock Tower in Boston and the National Cathedral in Washington, D.C. will turn off the lights for an hour is quite impressive.

Some airports will be participating in Earth Hour as well.

For example, at Los Angeles International Airport (LAX), the 100-foot-tall LAX Gateway pylons at the airport’s entrance will light solid green one hour before Earth Hour on Saturday, March 31. Then, during Earth Hour, from 8:30 to 9:30 p.m., the pylons will be turned off.

And in Chicago, O’Hare and Midway Airports will participate in Earth Hour by turning off non-essential lighting in the terminals, airport facilities and office buildings.

If you know of other airports planning to dim the lights on Saturday, please use the comments section to let us know.

NY-area airports want to fine unruly passengers for flight delays

Air Travel, Airlines, Airports, FAA, , , , , ,

Here’s an intriguing idea: the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, which operates JFK, LaGuardia and Newark International airports, wants to sue unruly passengers who cause major flight delays.  This is the story I wrote Monday for msnbc.com.

 

Unruly airline passengers at any of the three New York area airports (JFK, LaGuardia and Newark Liberty) may soon have to go to court and pay for the cost of delaying a flight.

“On a regular basis we’re having issues where planes have to come back to the gate because of disruptive passengers,” said Steve Coleman, spokesperson for the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, which operates the three airports. “We’re looking to cut down on the number of incidents that require police response and reduce the amount of time and money airlines lose because of these incidents.”

Coleman said the airport authority is embarking on a campaign that will include the use of social media, posted signs and other methods to strongly remind passengers to behave and follow the instruction of airline crewmembers.

“Our lawyers are also looking at ways we can take civil action against the most egregious cases,” said Coleman.

The cost per hour to operate a U.S. passenger airline is $5,867, according to Airlines for America (A4A), the airline trade association. “So any delay represents a real cost to an airline’s bottom line,” said A4A spokesperson Steve Lott. If the new policy is enacted, the Port Authority might sue passengers responsible for a delay to pay for the related costs.

In 2011, there were 1.3 million flights at the New York area airports and Port Authority and police responded to close to 400 incidents involving disruptive airline passengers. “Most of those were due to people who wouldn’t turn off their electronic devices, which is a federal law,” said Coleman. Many other incidents were related to smoking and passenger disputes.

“And it’s not just a New York thing,” said Coleman. “This resonates with airports across the country.”

Research conducted by the Airports Council International-North America (ACI-NA) shows that passengers often blame the airport for airline-related delays. “So, certainly the discussion the Port Authority is having is likely to prompt other airports to think about this,” said Debby McElroy, ACI-NA’s executive vice president, policy and external affairs.

The incidents-to-flights ratio at the New York area airports and elsewhere “is actually quite low, but any effort that helps enforce the message of what the laws are will help,” said A4A’s Lott.

Brandon M. Macsata, executive director of the Association for Airline Passenger Rights, said he applauds efforts to reduce airline delays, but it seems somewhat unfair to single out airline passengers for systemwide problems. “There can be numerous reasons why passengers might be responsible for delayed flights, including what happened two weeks ago when a family was escorted off the plane because their daughter wouldn’t stop crying.”

Passengers who interfere with the duties of a crewmember and engage in unruly behavior can be fined by the FAA or prosecuted on criminal charges. Reporting incidents to the FAA is at the discretion of crewmembers, and in 2011, as of October, the agency had taken action on 127 incidents nationwide.

“The Port Authority has not contacted the FAA. So we are unaware of their plans,” said FAA spokesperson Alison Duquette. “The bottom line is that people should know if they behave badly on an airplane they can go to jail or be fined.”

What do you think? Should airports be able to levy fines on unruly passengers who cause airplanes to return to the gate?

TSA finds a debrainer and guns, guns, guns

Airports, , ,

Once again, the TSA’s Friday round-up of prohibited, illegal and just plain wacky items found at airport checkpoints and in checked baggage is both entertaining and frightening.

On the list: something called a debrainer, inert shells from land mines, model rocket engines, automobile airbags marked “Explosive,” guns, stun guns, ammunition and knives.

And here’s a handy chart of ‘just’ the guns discovered in carry-on baggage at airports last week. The TSA says a lot of people “just forget” they have loaded guns in a purse or briefcase they take with them to the airport. Maybe I travel in far too innocent circles, but I find this hard to believe.