AIRPORT—LAX Emerges as Worst in U.S.

0



Airport Design Ill-Suited for New Security Screenings

Nicholas Hess was one frustrated traveler. Standing in his second hour-long line of the morning this one stretching more than 100 yards from the Southwest Airlines terminal at Los Angeles International Airport Hess said he had had enough.

“Since Sept. 11, I’ve traveled to Chicago, San Francisco, Phoenix and Las Vegas, and this is by far the worst airport,” said Hess, vice president of operations for Dunn-Edwards Paints in Los Angeles. “I had planned to travel during Christmas, even after Sept. 11, but this is just too much. I’m canceling my travel plans.”

Frustration at LAX is nothing new. But the scenes being played out this fall are reaching new depths and generating new worries.

“If those images are not soon replaced with other, more user-friendly images, then before long you will see impacts in both the convention business and the international travel markets,” said Michael Collins, senior vice president with the Los Angeles Convention & Visitors Bureau.

The real threat involves discretionary leisure passengers and meeting planners who schedule conferences and conventions, adds Norm Ross, senior vice president with the L.A. office of Delon, Hampton & Associates, a consulting engineering firm.

“For business travelers coming here to do deals, I don’t expect the inconvenience will deter them, since they don’t have many other options,” said Ross, who co-chairs the L.A. Area Chamber of Commerce’s transportation committee. “They will just grin and bear it.”

Even before Sept. 11, the airport ranked 14th among the 16 airports nationwide with more than 30 million annual passengers for customer satisfaction, according to a survey by J.D. Power & Associates.

“Back in August, the single toughest thing about LAX was the access to the airport,” said Michael Taylor, director of travel services at J.D. Power. “Getting through the 405 and Century Boulevard corridors is quite a challenge.”

But troubles intensified four days after the terrorist attacks when LAX reopened. It was the only major airport in the country where cars were banned from the terminal area. Mass confusion ensued as passengers tried to figure out where to park or pick up transportation.


Still hurting

“It takes a lot of time just to get in the door to the terminal,” said Ed Summers, vice president and general counsel for Harman International Industries Inc. “It’s easier at Salt Lake City, and, believe it or not, at JFK Airport in New York.”

Images of the long lines have been broadcast around the world. “It’s simply inexcusable,” said Michael Boyd, vice president of the Boyd Group, an Evergreen, Colo.-based aviation consulting firm. “LAX is probably the worst example I’ve seen of the problem.”

So why, at a time when airport officials and the airline industry should be doing everything to make it easier for passengers, is LAX so unfriendly?

Some of it involves overburdened security screeners and already existing traffic congestion the kind of troubles seen in other cities. But airport and travel industry consultants say LAX has another burden: its relatively compact size.

From the horseshoe designed loop that leaves the parking structures close to the terminals to the “shallow” design of the terminals with relatively short distance from curbside to gate, LAX was laid out in the late 1950s to speed passengers along through a minimum of space. It was not designed to accommodate multiple layers of security.


Designed for traffic flow

“LAX was designed for mobility,” said Andrew McKenzie, director of aviation modeling for the L.A. office of Citigroup Technologies. “That worked reasonably well before Sept. 11. But now, these security checks act as stop signs and at each stop sign, you need the capacity to “warehouse” passengers. LAX doesn’t have that room.”

What’s more, LAX has become the world’s busiest airport in numbers of arriving and departing passengers. “Other airports may have more passengers going through, but we have more arrivals and departures,” said Nancy Castles, spokeswoman for Los Angeles World Airports, the L.A. city agency that operates LAX. “That means more passengers to screen than any other airport.”

That was seen last week by the football field-long line snaking out the terminal doors and along the curb at Terminal 1, which houses Southwest, America West Airlines and U.S. Airways.

“It’s the busiest terminal and also one of the smallest, which is why the problem is most acute there,” said Jack Driscoll, former general manager of Los Angeles World Airports.

The small space also limits the ability of Huntleigh USA Inc., the contract security provider for Southwest, to install additional screening stations. Huntleigh managed to squeeze in two more screening posts last week, which reduced waits.

“We’re doing as much as we can to get passengers through quickly given the new Federal Aviation Administration guidelines,” said Southwest spokeswoman Brandy King.

But even before Sept. 11, there was a backlog in orders for screening equipment, according to Castles. Now, the waits have gone from weeks to months. What’s more, security screenings soon will be required for bags that are checked in, which is expected to create more delays.

In the short term, airport officials are left with limited options, such as public appeals about what is permissible to bring on board and what’s not.


Need for redesign

McKinzie and Driscoll said the terminals themselves need to be redesigned to allow for more “warehousing” of passengers.

“This makes the need for a new master plan more acute,” McKinzie said. “But instead of expanding to push through more passengers, the need now is for terminal design that relieves this passenger congestion at the security checkpoints.”

That extends to parking. Restrictions enacted during the initial weeks after Sept. 11 have been lifted, but the ban on curbside loading and unloading remains in place. LAX is believed to be the only major airport with such a ban.

Airport officials say it’s necessary because FAA rules prohibit parked vehicles from within 300 feet of terminals. LAX is hardest hit, again because of the horseshoe layout.

Castles said the alternative would probably involve a vehicle checkpoint on Century Boulevard before the airport entrance, similar to one operated by the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service near Oceanside. “That would back traffic up on Century Boulevard right back to the 405,” Castles said.

Airport officials say a bigger problem is drivers who ignore the rules.

“We now have only one lane of traffic for cars on the terminal access road,” Castles said. “Instead of moving right along to the nearest available parking terminal, many drivers are stopping right in the middle of that one lane to let off their passengers. That’s now illegal and it creates total havoc for everyone else.”

No posts to display