The shoes thing is great, but honestly the best part is 95% of the people know what they are doing in PreCheck lines vs 25% in the normal line. It’s like eliminating bad and slow drivers from the road.
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Low key flex as best airport experience in Kansas City: flying private in and outta the downtown airport…
Used to love the DEN and LAX experiences when they had easily accessible smoking lounges…
@Tron and @Randy should prepare themselves for the airport experience to end them all if their SingAir flight sees them have a layover at Chiangmai in Singapore. THE BEST AIRPORT IN THE WORLD and it’s not even close.
I got my haircut there at 3am local time, there’s a spa, a movie theatre, arcade and fucking amusement park for the kids. Amazing food and easy to traverse…
As is the NEW Hong Kong airport. Takes forever and a year to get out there but it’s Asia’s hub and has everything… including smoking lounges.
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I just moved to Buffalo… this is veeeery interesting and helpful!
The Singapore episode of The Layover by Anthony Bourdain is an all time favorite. Not just in Bourdain bits. In all of cinema.
Also need to throw out a recommendation for the Virgin Atlantic lounge at Heathrow. Next time anyone flies from the east coast to London or vice versa, take the plunge and fly virgin first class. Everyone should experience their lounge and in flight service once in a lifetime, like a Tara Iti visit of transatlantic travel.
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LAX is best experienced airside.
I love Tom Bradley International Terminal. When I had nothing to do on a football Sunday, I’d buy a refundable ticket for any airline/terminal for next day/Monday morning. That allowed me access to any terminal at LAX within 24hrs of my flight. I’d head over to Tom Bradley, take pictures of airplanes, have a beer, watch football, have a beer, take pictures of airplanes, have another beer, watch different cultures of the world arrive at different time blocks throughout the day, have another beer, etc. When I’d get home that night I’d just cancel my ticket and get my money back. Honestly so much fun for a nerd like me.
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Sir do you run the Airport Beers meme page?
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I was bummed when JetBlue left Long Beach Airport. I live in LBC, and used the airport for weekly travel to Bay Area for 3 years, Southwest was the airline. I loved flying out of there. Now that JetBlue has left I am forced to fly out of the shitshow that is LAX. The gates for JetBlue are fine, its the getting in an out of LAX that I loathe. If and when I do fly out of LAX I use a car service.
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How do they balance out who sits in the front? I’m gonna go out on a limb based on the picture that there were a few criteria the pilot had in mind 
“Here, let me show you how the comms work. Yeah, it’s a pretty dangerous job but someone’s gotta do it.”
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Yes, there may have been some of that, and that might have been one of the reasons that my wife didn’t enjoy it!
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its so “pilot-y”
Are you Erik Anders Lang?
Laz you gotta get in front of whoever’s throwing out marketing dollars at the other big boys. Gotta think Matt offers a lot more in terms of recognition to people who actually travel for golf.
Your pitch “United are using this hack who’s pivoted from golf travel to golf multi-level marketing, you’re smart enough to actually want to reach the golf travel consumer, aren’t you?”
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I will barely try to defend MCI.
When I lived in KC, I actually liked it. It was 20-25 minutes from home and easy to park and fly out of quickly (except for TSA Pre being nonexistent or on the opposite side of the terminal). Southwest flies to 35 cities direct, incl. Cancun. When I lived there, they had a route to Jamaica and we could be at our resort by noon.
Now I live in Omaha. It is 30-35 minutes from home and meh to fly out of. TSA Pre is better. But Southwest only flies to NINE cities direct, none international. Most of the time, I have to connect in Charlotte or ATL, yuck.
If you are connecting in either, why? They both suck.
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I’ll throw in a a little love for CLE. Lived on the west side for a couple years within range of a convenient and cheap uber. Don’t think I ever waited more than 10 minutes to get through security with some mornings literally being able to walk right up to the body scanner. Didn’t seem to matter what day of the week it was. I’m a humble peasant unconcerned with lounges and affiliations to the airlines so I can’t speak to those amenities but as a simple man just wanting to spend as little time in the airport as possible and be bothered by the least amount of people, CLE shined. Did have to shuttle to the rental car setup which always sucks but if it’s home base it’s better.
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I’ve got no issues with ATL. Yeah its huge and isn’t the nicest place in the world, but every terminal has multiple food options and the planes tend to take off on time, which again, is the only reason I am on the damn plane in the first place.
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I commuted through ATL every week about 10 years ago and it was always serviceable. Still shudder at the state of the mens rooms on a Monday morning.
DTW is a great spot for my home airport now, pretty much direct flights anywhere in the world but I’ll give a shoutout to YQG airport in Windsor. Only 10 mins across the border and (at least pre-pandemic) you could fly to Europe for half the price as from DTW. No TSA BS and returning customs are 10x easier than returning through a US airport.
Canadian airports got zero run on the pods, but I’ve been to a bunch of them and would love to hear from our friends to the north how they feel about their airports. I find almost all of them to be among the most pleasant in the world, but here’s how I’d rank the ones I’ve been to:
Major/Intl Airports:
Vancouver (YVR) - Vancouver is great. To borrow Ben’s observation about Bozeman, YVR has a great sense of place. Looks like it belongs in the PNW. Amazing entry lobby/check in. The last time I was there, construction around security was a tough scene, but it is otherwise efficient, beautiful, and relatively easy to access. Views flying in and out are pristine.
Edmonton (YEG) - This was my home airport for the four years I lived in Alberta, and it is a fantastic medium-sized international airport. Layout is great, clean, beautiful interior (with tons of recent upgrades) and a good smattering of routes all over North America and a few to Europe, as well. The US Customs pre-clearance is fantastic. It’s quite a distance from the city (about 30 KM), but in the summer, flying in and seeing miles of bright yellow canola fields is stunning.
Calgary (YYC) - Really solid Int’l airport. Good food and bev, spacious, airy, and easy to navigate baggage claim and customs. Easy to get to rental cars and another stunning airport to fly in and out of with the rockies and city skyline in the background.
Montreal (YUL) - A decent airport for its size. Somewhat dated now. Fairly easy to navigate and close to city. Haven’t been there in a number of years.
Halifax (YHZ) - Just kinda dated. Nothing particularly wrong with it.
Winnipeg (YWG) - Same as YHZ. It’s ok, nothing to write home about. International customs feels like its in a basement and I remember it being like a long, narrow hallway that was very cramped. Limited food offerings. Not a place I’d want a layover, but pretty inoffensive if its your home airport, I guess.
Toronto (YYZ) - Fuck YYZ. It’s one of the biggest, busiest clusterfucks on earth. Multiple terminal buildings with no efficient means of transport, a million fucking people at all hours of the day and night, taxi delays are super common because it’s so spread out and they often use parallel takeoff but perpendicular landing runways. Not particularly appealing to the eye, also a long ass way from downtown. Another I haven’t been to in quite a few years but no desire to go back and have my opinions of it confirmed or changed.
Medium-Large Canadian Airports I’ve not visited: Ottawa, Quebec, Saskatoon, Regina, St. John’s, Kelowna)
Medium/Small Airports in no particular order:
Fredericton, NB (YFC) - Only flown in and out once, no issues, very small, but efficient. Limited service.
Saint John, NB (YSJ) - Small, but again, efficient. Super clean. Long way from the city.
Nanaimo, BC - Amazing small general aviation airport. I seem to remember the FBO we parked at was almost a log cabin aesthetic? It was a long time ago, but what a beautiful place and neat little airport.
Victoria, BC - Haven’t been there in so long I can’t remember much.
Boundary Bay, BC - At one time was one of the busiest airports in Canada by aircraft movements. Huge operational GA base. ATC was unbelievably efficient.
Edmonton City Centre - ECC Airport is now closed, but when they said City Centre, they meant it. Was like, juuuuust north of downtown. Before it closed, it had air charter and limited commercial service to northern Alberta towns. The first time I went there we flew into YEG, took a cab to City Centre, and then took a small air charter to Grand Prairie, AB where my dad was interviewing for a job. Before CC closed, they used it for some Indy Car races in the late 2000s, which is sick.
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YVR is a great airport. You get the big Bill Reid Spirit of Haida Gwaii statue right as you walk in which, I agree, does give a sense of belonging in the PNW. Also, easy access to the city with rapid transit directly to the airport.
Also, not really an airport discussion (but kindof…), but doing Harbour to Harbour from Vancouver to Victoria by seaplane is a great treat.
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Have spent a lot of time in YHZ, YUL, and YYZ and mostly agree with this.
I lived in Halifax for several years so YHZ was my home airport - it still pretty much is considering where I live now (Cape Breton) only has a tiny regional airport (YQY). Would say that security is very efficient at YHZ but the food options are severely lacking - especially post-customs if you’re flying to the US. It’s not crazy far from downtown but your transit options are limited (this is a major problem for Halifax at-large) - might be better now since the city finally got Uber.
YUL always feel way further from downtown than it actually is. Fine airport.
YYZ is a nightmare. Billy Bishop is super legit though.
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We looked at doing this when we were in Vancouver in '19 but decided it did not fit within our itinerary. I definitely will do it at some point, though.
The hardwood paneled ceiling and green-colored accents throughout are such a beautiful, understated way of making you feel like you’re in a large evergreen forest, without being gaudy or claustrophobic. So much greenery throughout that airport, actually. And ceiling skylights. Just a wonderfully cohesive and well executed aesthetic.