Chicago Midway (customer experience, travels)
by at 2:32 PM
Okay, clearly there is a huge traveling recession right now (I was the only passenger on the airport shuttle both ways, and neither flight was even close to full, and the airport is pretty deserted), BUT Midway has perhaps the best TSA process ever. There are three lines at the beginning for beginner, casual, and expert traveler. I took the "expert" line, and I was the only one in it, until a family of three (which technically didn't fit the "expert" guideilnes since they had more than one carryon each) came up behind me and I let them get in front of me since I was caught by surprise at having basically no time to get my laptop out of my backpack and my shoes off. Huh.
Oh, and the TSA screeners in the expert line were friendly and talkative. It really changed the dynamic, since they knew they they were in for a quick screening. (Also, the pre-screening guy who checked my boarding pass was poring over my boarding pass for every little detail since, again, there was nobody else so he could actually do a proper job. Not that that's really advantageous in this case though.)
Comments
- Complaining out loud about the way my feet smelled, as if I had a choice as to whether to take my shoes off.
- Taking my toothpaste, and making a joke about Somalis stealing it from the trash.
- Taking me to task about my GP32 (semi-obscure handheld game system), asking what it was, where I got it, etc.
Making work for total fucking meatheads who couldn't get a job otherwise, and maintaining a sick, politically-motivated illusion of "security", are the main reasons they are there, and do the things they do.
If it works out at Midway, they are going to consider a wider test. To my knowledge, the experiment at Midway is going well.
BTW, its not a travel recession that made Midway slow. Its the fact that 95% of the traffic into Chicago goes to O'Hell, not Midway. Midway is almost exclusively a commuter and private plane airport these days.
Gedvondur