Los Angeles International Airport

Tidbits for travelers: LAX views, Orlando news, & KCI cruise

Airports, Architecture, Events, Festivals, Free Stuff, free Wi-Fi, Fun Stuff, Layover, Observation Decks, Openings, Wi-Fi, , , , , , ,

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 19th, 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.

Fresh art at LAX

Art,

Unless you’re in the right terminal, you run the risk of missing some of the great art that gets exhibited at Los Angeles International Airport (LAX).  For example, right now there are several new exhibits up in Terminal 1:

My Toy Robots includes 20 paintings by Frank Minuto depicting brightly colored vintage robots and graffiti-style text.

Altimetry is an exhibition of more than 30 paintings and photographs by ten artists depicting cloud formations, stars and horizons.

Dispersion, by Meeson Pae Yang, is a three-dimensional portrayal of artificial plant seeds and spores “carried through the air in a pristine recreation of natural events.” The site-specific installation is made from natural and synthetic materials, such as preserved moss, vinyl and silicone tubing.

And there are twenty-two abstract paintings by Quinton Bemiller, which depict “a kind of fictional landscape through the accumulation of color and form.”

All this work is in Terminal 1 at Los Angeles International Airport.  For more information about this work and other exhibits at LAX, see the LAX website.

Free movies at LAX

Air Travel, Airports, Art, Exhibits, Layover, Movies,

If you’re waiting for friends or family to arrive at Los Angeles International Airport (LAX), or have a long layover and have already popped over to the Theme Building and taken the elevator up to the Encounter Restaurant, then make your way to the arrivals area at the Tom Bradley International Terminal (TBIT) and catch a film.

Seventeen artists have created “custom moving image work” (video art) for the two giant installations in the TBIT arrivals area. One screen is a 25-foot monitor grid; the other screen links 58 monitors together in a 90-foot long serpentine filmstrip.

Filmstrip video screen at LAX

What will you see?  The topics and themes are pretty far-ranging, but here are just two of the descriptions that seem especially appropriate for the airport:

Current by Patty Chang and Noah Klersfeld:

“Filmed in the baggage handling area of LAX. two kaleidoscopic videos play back to back.  First, 25 screens show the repeated image of a houseplant traveling on conveyor belts from the check-in counter to the baggage sorter. Then, the 25 screens simultaneously show 25 different versions of that journey.  Order sits beside chaos.”

To and From LAX, by Chip Lord, includes:

“footage from airports around the world to represent the global network and reflect the travel patterns to and from LAX. From amongst the universal spaces of travel emerge the emotions of greeting, boredom, and excitement as 25 destinations are represented.”

Altogether the new video installations at LAX offers three hours of artist-made material. Enough to entertain you and your kids through a long delay. Enough to make you want to volunteer to pick up a friend at the airport. And maybe enough to make you schedule a long layover, so you can say you went to LA for dinner and a movie – at the airport.

(Photos courtesy:Jay Berkowitz/LAWA)

LAX art exhibit: Strangers’ Luggage

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When you’re standing in line waiting to go through the security checkpoint at the airport, aren’t you just a little bit curious about what the TSA folks are seeing on those x-ray screens as everyone’s carry-on bag passes by?

Los Angeles artist Juanita Meneses must have wondered, because she created a series of paintings, Strangers’ Luggage, depicting hand-painted bags and their x-rayed contents.  Now six 8’ x 8’ vinyl banners depicting those works are on display in the Terminal 3 baggage claim area at Los Angeles International Airport.

“Almost like self-portraits, Meneses’ imagery reveals how objects can identify as well as aid us as we move through the transformative experience of travel. By removing these objects from their usual domestic context, Meneses’ artworks provide an opportunity to contemplate conventional, personal objects as they travel through the public sphere.”

Look for the Strangers’ Luggage series in the Terminal 3 baggage claim at Los Angeles International Airport through July 25, 2010.

Tidbits for travelers: art at LAX & Burlington Int’l Airport

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If you’re going to be out and about in airports this week, here are some things to look for:

At Los Angeles International Airport, there are more than 25 paintings in Op Collage, a new exhibition of abstract forms by artist Yong Sin made from acrylic, masking tape, paper and wood. Look for them in Terminal 1, post-security, by Gates 1 and 2 through the May 2010.

And while its website doesn’t give you a clue about what you’ll find inside, Vermont’s Burlington International Airport (BTV) has some really impressive artwork on-site, including John Anderson’s Skygates: four large murals placed in the the airport skylights. Each mural has its own color theme and content, including “alphabets and notational systems from around the world (red), pictographs and icons from art and cultural history (green), scientific diagrams and formulas (yellow) and cosmology (blue).”

Poking around today I see mention of other permanent and temporary work at BTV and I’ll circle back later in the week with some better images. But in the meantime, here’s just a peek at what’s inside.

Airports – and now airlines – trash talking each other

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For my At the Airport column on USAToday.com this month, Airport wars escalate with attack ads aimed at rivals, I wrote about a new YouTube video about San Francisco International Airport, that features cameo appearances by SF  Mayor Gavin Newsom and Marion & Vivian Brown, the kooky 83-year-old identical twins who have become beloved San Francisco icons.  Designed to promote SFO as the connecting hub of choice for travelers coming to the United States from New Zealand or Australia, the short video compares SFO’s airy, international terminal to an unnamed airport simply referred to as “the bad airport.”

An SFO spokesperson insists there is no specific “bad airport,” but given the target market I’d guess, oh… that LAX is the airport campaign designers had in mind.

Other airports have no problem calling out the competitor they’re trashing by name. Canada’s Edmonton International Airport recently rolled out a “Stop the Calgary Habit” campaign, urging residents of central and northern Alberta to stop connecting through or driving to Calgary International Airport.  The campaign has tag line: “When you go south, so does your air service,”; videos showing repentant passengers; and a tool kit that includes an “Emergency Hypno Cure” to help break the habit.

Of course, there was the challenge Air New Zealand threw down to Southwest Airlines.  Air New Zealand  produced a series of cheeky commercials and an in-flight safety video that showed airline employees dressed in nothing but cleverly applied body paint.  Then ANZ challenged Southwest Airlines to do the same:

Southwest’s answer?  “We’d rather rap”:

Now we have two airlines trading smackdown videos.  Air Tran Airways and Southwest.  See how Southwest started it.

Air Tran’s response?

“We thought about it and thought about it and decided to not respond at all. After all, focusing on running the best low-cost carrier in America is enough to keep us busy.  BUT…if we were to respond, it might look something like this:”

Can’t wait to see what’s next!

Landmarks, hotels & airports turning off lights for Earth Hour

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(courtesy: Jorge Sierra / WWF-Spain)

Attention travelers and aliens assigned to monitor our planet from outer space: you may notice major landmarks, tourist attractions, and large areas of many cities and towns around the world going dark for an hour on March 27.

Do not be alarmed. It’s just Earth Hour, a rolling, global black-out designed to draw attention to climate change. First organized in Sydney, Australia back in 2007, during last year’s Earth Hour there were voluntary lights-out events in 87 countries. This year, millions of people, more than 115 countries, thousands of cities and hundreds of major attractions and landmarks worldwide have pledged to switch off the lights for an hour as well.

My msnbc.com column this week, Lights out for climate change, lists just some of the landmarks and attractions participating in the carefully choreographed event that kicks off Saturday night at 8:30 p.m. local time in New Zealand’s Chatham Islands and then follow time zones around the globe, ending with an hour of darkness in the South Pacific island of Samoa almost 25 hours later.  You can see the complete list on the Earth Hour website,  but some of the places that will go dark include the Eiffel Tower, the Empire State Building, the Golden Gate Bridge, UN Headquarters in NY, Seattle’s Space Needle and the Smithsonian Castle in Washington, D.C.

(courtesy WWF / Maverick Photo Agency)

Some people think the whole Earth Hour project is silly.  But no matter where you stand on the issue of global warming or the ability of a single, simple event to make a difference, it will be impressive to see so many usually-lit places go dark, if just for an hour.

Many hotels around the world are participating in Earth Hour by turning off lights in public areas and offering candlelit dinners.  In England, though, when five Starwood hotels turn off their lights, hotel staff will begin pedaling special bicycles that will generate enough power to light up the hotel lobbies.

Several airports are also joining in Earth Hour as well, turning off lights that are not essential for safety or security.  You’ll notice lights out at airports in Toronto, Calgary, Amsterdam, London (Luton), Singapore, and Los Angeles, where the iconic, colorful, 100-foot-tall LAX Gateway pylons that stand at the airport’s entrance will glow a steady, solid green between 7:30 and 8:30 p.m. and then turn off completely between 8:30 and 9:30 p.m.

(courtesy Los Angeles International Airport)

Connection conundrum: SFO or LAX?

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If you’re traveling to or from New Zealand or Australia, you’ll have a make a connection in California at either LAX or SFO.

San Francisco would like you to make your connection through San Francisco International Airport (SFO) and has kicked off the “I Wanna Go Through SFO” campaign to urge folks to consciously make the choice to connect through SFO rather than LAX. The campaign includes this sort of cute video, which includes cameos by Mayor Gavin Newsom and the iconic SF Twins and lines like “…there’s the bad airport and then there’s San Franscisco International Airport.”

OK, LA. Let’s see what’s you’ve got!

Fun free stuff you’ll find at airports

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Google’s “Free WiFi for the Holidays” program – the one that made wireless Internet access free at a boatload of airports – ends on January 15th.

But don’t fret. Too much.

Plenty of airports had free Wi-Fi before the promotion and continue to offer it.  And once the Google airport promotion ends, you’ll find a few airports that once offered fee-based Wi-Fi continuing to offer it for free.  Seattle-Tacoma International Airport (SEA) is one of them.

I’m working on a list of others.

I’m all for free Wi-Fi at all airports. It will happen. In the meantime, I’m keeping tabs on some of the other airport freebies that are out there. I’ve included some of them – including free cookies at Fort Wayne International Airport(FWA) and free toothbrushes at Wisconsin’s Outagamie County Regional Airport (ATW)  – in a column that will post on USAToday.com tomorrow.

But here are few others I didn’t have room for.

For the past year, Lambert-St. Louis International Airport (STL) has been giving away luggage tags. Thousands of ‘em.

At Detroit Metro Airport (DTW) they (still) hand out plastic wings (pins); mostly to kids.

Just about every terminal at Los Angeles International Airport (LAX) offers complimentary shoe shines (tips are encouraged).

And in at least one small airport in Minnesota, early risers get coffee for free.

“We fire up the coffee pots on our cafe counter in the terminal and give away free coffee to passengers for the first flight out (07:10) each day,” says Shaun Germolus, the Executive Director of the Range Regional Airport (HIB)in Hibbing, MN.  “We try to do the same thing whenever we are aware of flight delays as well.”

Have you found a great freebie at an airport? Let us know!

Next time you’re stuck at the airport, don’t get bored: get vaccinated.

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FLU POSTER SPITTING

The vaccine for the H1N1 vaccine isn’t available quite yet, but there are plenty of regular, seasonal flu shots around. And this year there are also plenty of airports where you can get a flu shot on the fly.  I tracked down the details for my At the Airport column on USAToday.com: Airports ready for passengers seeking flu shots.

FLU CARTOON

Last year travelers could get flu shots at about two dozen airports, including San Francisco International Airport, Des Moines International Airport, Cleveland Hopkins International Airport, Denver International Airport, and others. This year, with so many people concerned about getting sick, more airports are making room for flu shot kiosks.

And because of the heightened awareness, several airport clinics, including the UIC Medical Center at O’Hare, Orlando International Airport’s Solantic clinic, and the AeroClinic at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport, began offering flu shots to the public back around Labor Day, even though the official flu season doesn’t usually begin until October. And airports such as Tampa International, which in the past offered flu shot clinics for employees only, arranged to have flu shot kiosks available for the traveling public.

FLU SHOT POSTER 1960s

Over the next few weeks, flu shot programs will be rolling out at Louisville International Airport, Sacramento International Airport, Philadelphia International Airport and others. Harmony Pharmacy will offer flu shots at its year-round clinics and from temporary kiosks at New York JFK and Newark-Liberty airports.

A spokesperson from Airport MD said that company hopes to offer flu shots by October 1st in Miami, Las Vegas and Minneapolis-St. Paul airports. Several other airports, including San Diego International Airport and Oakland International Airport, are still working out their flu shot program details. And Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport, which for the past three years has been able to offer flu shots for free during a few days towards the end of the season, expects that this year it will be able to do the same.

flu shot

To find out if flu shots are being offered at an airport near you, please see the flu shot chart included with my USATODAY.com column: Airports are ready for passengers seeking flu shots.