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How to fuck up an airport

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Re: How to fuck up an airport

#171

Post by sneak »

xxpor wrote: post #158
probably_wrong wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you listen to the podcast they explain that it wasn't his fault. Spoilers: he designed BER for fast passenger transit, just like Tegel, but the airport authorities wanted more shopping space. So they crammed as many shops as they could in detriment of the passenger experience. And then there's the situation with the rise of low-cost airlines who weren't allowed to use the jetway... I definitely recommend listening…

The whole not using the jetway thing in Germany blows my mind. I flew Lufthansa SEA-FRA in 2019, and the fully packed 747 had to walk onto the ramp, and load up into buses to get to the terminal. Outrageous. The only time I've ever done that in NA is flying at places like CAK in a micro regional jet.

They also cram the busses sardine-full, despite having signs all over exhorting everyone to keep a 1,5m distance, and half the people are unmasked.

thisisfine.jpg

Re: How to fuck up an airport

#172

Post by sneak »

chrisseaton wrote: post #16
odiroot wrote: post #7

Best way: close the actual city airport that was functioning like a well-oiled machine and was loved by the city population. Even better, do it against their explicit wishes with a shady decision that reeks of corruption. Any follow-up to that will always end up being "fucked up".

> functioning like a well-oiled machine and was loved by the city population You can’t possibly mean Tegel? I’ve never met anyone who has used Tegel who didn’t think it was clearly the worst airport in the world. I used to literally avoid doing any business in Berlin because Tegel was so painful.

Tegel was great but operating well beyond design capacity and it showed. It was always super crowded, and there is no good public transit to it (the busses to Alex don't count).

Re: How to fuck up an airport

#173

Post by p_l »

djhworld wrote: post #84
anamexis wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know, given the experience at Tegel, I'd say past performance is very indicative of future. What a terrible airport that was.

I found it quite novel, checking in and then immediately going through security to your gate behind. A lot of airports are vast complexes and takes you a while to get from A - B, Tegel was quite quaint in comparison! Admittedly for a major/global city - it was too small.

It's something that might trip people up, but due to West/East Germany split and Interflug going under after unification, Berlin airports are peripheral - leaves in flight graph, not hubs except for low cost airlines. Lufthansa continues to use Munich and Frankfurt as hubs.

Re: How to fuck up an airport

#174

Post by netr0ute »

ginko wrote: post #47
franze wrote: post #26

I just landed in BER 20 minutes ago and I am just amazed how bad the signage is The signs tiny and all in the same red/white color. The monitors tiny and sparse. The placement of the tickets for the trains placed where you do not pass. And just good luck if you go down the wrong stairway and then reached the nowhere, without any visible signs. They cared about the CI way more than about fast passenger throughput.

>They cared about the CI way more than about fast passenger throughput. Continuous integration?

Customer Intelligence

Re: How to fuck up an airport

#175

Post by zhte415 »

ginko wrote: post #47
franze wrote: post #26

I just landed in BER 20 minutes ago and I am just amazed how bad the signage is The signs tiny and all in the same red/white color. The monitors tiny and sparse. The placement of the tickets for the trains placed where you do not pass. And just good luck if you go down the wrong stairway and then reached the nowhere, without any visible signs. They cared about the CI way more than about fast passenger throughput.

>They cared about the CI way more than about fast passenger throughput. Continuous integration?

Crazy Ivan

Re: How to fuck up an airport

#176

Post by joecool1029 »

xxpor wrote: post #157
lotsofpulp wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> First: post-security you will find some of the most disgusting food ever served in an airport, but hey it’s also expensive and the servers don’t hide how much they hate being there! This also describes all 3 major NYC airports. I have to plan around it and bring food with me.

The food at terminal C at EWR post renovation is perfectly fine, if ridiculously expensive. Terminal A sucks though. Can't say anything about B, I've only used EWR for domestic travel.

Terminal A is being replaced this year if the new one isn't already open. But yes, the old one sucked, worst terminal at EWR.

Re: How to fuck up an airport

#178

Post by Atsuii »

xxpor wrote: post #158
probably_wrong wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you listen to the podcast they explain that it wasn't his fault. Spoilers: he designed BER for fast passenger transit, just like Tegel, but the airport authorities wanted more shopping space. So they crammed as many shops as they could in detriment of the passenger experience. And then there's the situation with the rise of low-cost airlines who weren't allowed to use the jetway... I definitely recommend listening…

The whole not using the jetway thing in Germany blows my mind. I flew Lufthansa SEA-FRA in 2019, and the fully packed 747 had to walk onto the ramp, and load up into buses to get to the terminal. Outrageous. The only time I've ever done that in NA is flying at places like CAK in a micro regional jet.

Apron buses are very common in large airports and I always found it really efficient. From memory I’ve used them at Haneda, Narita and KL. Perhaps the ones in Germany are just altered metro buses though, which would be terrible. Apron buses are efficient due to being low to the ground, having very wide doors to accomodate quick loading and unloading, typically no seats.

Re: How to fuck up an airport

#179

Post by FastMonkey »

ginko wrote: post #47
franze wrote: post #26

I just landed in BER 20 minutes ago and I am just amazed how bad the signage is The signs tiny and all in the same red/white color. The monitors tiny and sparse. The placement of the tickets for the trains placed where you do not pass. And just good luck if you go down the wrong stairway and then reached the nowhere, without any visible signs. They cared about the CI way more than about fast passenger throughput.

>They cared about the CI way more than about fast passenger throughput. Continuous integration?

Cool Infographics

Re: How to fuck up an airport

#180

Post by hackernewds »

redsid wrote: post #137

A few decades ago, when my boss (senior exec at major US airline) was negotiating to be a part of Denver International Airport - he wrote in legalese requiring Denver Stapleton airport to be shutdown. He expected DIA to have tons of problems which it did, but killing Stapleton kept DIA on track. Couple of anecdotes - the baggage handling design (I saw the revised version) was shuttling suitcases easily above 25 miles…

What is the conspiracy take on the giant devil blue unicorn outside the DIA airport?
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