#When Does Pittsburgh International Airport Open

[dankusner]

After publishing White House tapes, the Tribune told Nixon his time was up

On April 30, 1974, the Tribune’s jet landed at Meigs Field on the lakefront instead of Midway Airport on the Southwest Side so its cargo could be delivered to Tribune Tower more quickly.

The Tribune was going for a big scoop.

The airplane carried transcripts of secret tape recordings of White House conversations that President Richard M. Nixon had announced would be released on May 1.

Those tapes proved to be Nixon’s undoing.

The Golden Rule of public relations is if you have something to hide, don’t.

Get it out there before an opponent does.

Congress was considering articles of impeachment and had subpoenaed the tapes.

The recordings would prove crucial to the investigation of the Watergate scandal, which began on June 17, 1972, when burglars were caught in the Democratic National Headquarters in Washington, D.C.

One had an address book with a White House phone number.

Immediately after Nixon’s 1974 speech on the pending release of the tapes, the Tribune’s publisher, Stanton Cook, phoned Editor-in-Chief Clayton Kirkpatrick.

“While we were talking, we agreed that the full text would be a fascinating document,” Kirkpatrick recalled. “We decided to find out if we could publish the whole thing quickly.”

He got up on a desk to tell the newsroom staff of the plan.

The logistics were daunting.

The transcript would be released at the Government Printing Office in Washington.

It contained two to three times the words the Tribune published daily.

In an age before computers, setting text into type was laborious, and the project’s gears had to perfectly mesh.

They did.

The plane took off at 5 a.m.

Onboard were a flock of copy editors and the superintendents of the composing room and the engraving department.

The moment the Government Printing Office opened, Frank Starr, the Washington bureau chief, bought two copies of the 50 volumes of transcripts and rushed them to Dulles International Airport.

“We spent five minutes on the ground looking at the documents and then we took off,” recalled Assistant News Editor Richard Leslie. “We started working before we were airborne.”

President Richard M. Nixon points to the transcripts of the White House tapes after he announced during a nationally-televised speech on April 29, 1974, that he would turn over the transcripts to House impeachment investigators. (AP Photo)

As the objective was to put a verbatim copy of the report into readers’ hands, Leslie and the others didn’t put the text through a standard copy-editing routine: trimming and alternative phrasings.

“All we did actually was mark the copy for the typesetters — capitalizations, paragraphs, that sort of thing,” Leslie added. “We didn’t change anything, additions or deletions.”

When they arrived at Tribune Tower, Leslie recalled: “We chopped the bindings with paper cutters and made three more copies.”

Those were initially distributed to 18 typesetters — and subsequently to additional typesetters, as more and more pages became available.

The next morning, Tribune buyers paid 50 cents for the paper with the special section containing the 300,000 words of Nixon’s tapes.

A bargain, considering the price of the transcript at the Government Printing Office was $12.25.

Television spread the word of the Tribune’s coup, and the paper was swamped with requests for the 44-page special section.

“A special air shipment of 2,500 copies of the transcript was being flown yesterday from the Tribune to a news dealer in Los Angeles who has been deluged with requests for the supplement,” the Tribune reported on May 3.

“One news dealer in Pittsburgh, where a newspaper strike is in progress, sent a truck to Chicago to pick up 1,500 copies to be sold at newsstands there.”

The May 1, 1974 edition of the Chicago Tribune and coverage of the Watergate scandal involving President Richard Nixon. (Chicago Tribune)

The Hawk Eye, in Burlington, Iowa, was given permission to copy the Tribune’s special section and distribute it to the newspaper’s 20,000 subscribers.

Librarians at Lake Superior College in Sault Ste. Marie, Michigan, taped 44 pages of the Tribune to a long wall.

“It brought crowds of students whose comments caused librarian Charles Nair to dub the display the ‘Wailing Wall.’”

In the bewailing of Nixon’s perfidy, the librarian heard echoes of Jews mourning their Jerusalem Temple.

Ever cognizant of its own place in history, the Tribune in one story compared its triumph with the transcripts to “the newspaper’s publication of the Versailles Treaty in 1919 and the Yalta Papers in 1955.”

The pump had been primed for the Tribune’s scoop, with leaks on Nixon’s White House conversations appearing in the months leading up to the release of the tapes.

The more juicy episodes made readers eager to see if the transcript rendered them fact or fiction.

“President Nixon made disparaging remarks about Jews and called Judge J. Sirica a ‘wop,’” The New York Times reported in 1973, attributing those quotations to “sources with direct knowledge of the president’s comments.”

Sirica was presiding over the Watergate burglars’ trial.

“Report Nixon threatened to ‘fix’ Democrats’ lawyer,” an Associated Press headline proclaimed. “I wouldn’t want to be in Edward Bennett Williams’ position after the election,” was attributed to Nixon in the accompanying story.

“He referred to the ‘moral attitude’ of some of his Republican critics as if morality was somehow embarrassing,” the Tribune noted Nixon as saying on the tapes.

Such was only the titillating tip of the iceberg.

The full transcript contained more than one smoking gun, and the administration panicked when its existence was revealed in July 1973, when former White House staffer Alexander Butterfield testified before a Senate Select Committee investigating Watergate.

“Mr. Butterfield, are you aware of the instillation of any listening devices in the Oval Office of the president?” he was asked.

“I was aware of listening devices, yes, sir,” he replied, instantly making the investigation more than a disputed debate.

Nixon claimed executive privilege entitled him to the advice of aides who didn’t fear their words coming back to haunt them.

He made Attorney General John Mitchell a sacrificial scapegoat, saying the “Big Tuna,” as he dubbed him, was at fault.

Saying he took full responsibility for the misdeeds of his subordinates, Nixon dramatically accepted the resignations of his top aides, H. R. Halderman and John Erlichman, and Attorney General Richard G. Kleindienst.

He fired his counsel, John W. Dean, who alerted him to the impending scandal and was entrusted with keeping a lid on it.

“There can be no whitewash at the White House,” Nixon said in a televised appeal to the public.

On what was known as the Saturday Night Massacre, Nixon ordered Attorney General Elliot Richardson to fire the special prosecutor, Archibald Cox. Richardson refused and resigned. Nixon ordered Deputy Attorney General William Ruckelshaus to fire Cox, and Ruckelshaus resigned.

Special Watergate prosecutor Archibald Cox, left, and Philip A. Lacovara, one of his assistants, walk between newsmen in Washington, Sept. 20, 1973, following the meeting in the Executive Office Building with President Nixon's attorneys.

The meeting was held in an effort to settle out of court the battle over presidential tapes related to the Watergate affair.

Nixon appointed another special prosecutor who got a court order in April 1974 requiring Nixon to turn over various documents to a grand jury.

Nixon produced edited versions of some of the recordings.

His lawyer struggled to explain why there were “inaudible and unintelligible gaps.”

An audio expert said an 18½-minute gap resulted from “numerous erasures and rerecordings.”

But by then, the Tribune had published the full-length transcript.

Readers learned that Nixon ordered Dean to spy on the president’s opponents.

”We have not used the (Federal Bureau of Investigation) and we have not used the Justice Department, but things are going to change, and they are going to do it right or go,” Nixon said. “We have been (adjective deleted) fools.”

Readers of those copies of the Tribune trucked to Pittsburgh and flown to Los Angeles read how Nixon took the heat off himself by having one aide persuade another to plead guilty:

“Just start here by (telling) how the president has great affection for you and your family. I was just thinking … last night, poor little kid, lovely wife and all the rest. It just breaks your heart.”

Chicago and the Midwest had been strongholds of Nixon support that faded away in 1974 after Nixon was linked to the Watergate scandal.

The Tribune was the only newspaper in the country to print the entire transcript and then called for Nixon's resignation. (Chicago Tribune)

Chicago and the Midwest had been strongholds of Nixon support, but that faded away in 1974 after President Richard M. Nixon was linked to the Watergate scandal.

The Tribune was the only newspaper in the country to print the entire transcript and then called for Nixon’s resignation. (Chicago Tribune)

Throughout his career, Nixon rebuffed criticism by besmirching critics.

But that wouldn’t work with the Tribune — a solidly Republican newspaper that more than 100 years earlier had stage-managed Abraham Lincoln’s presidential nomination.

The game was up when the Tribune published an editorial headlined: ”Listen, Mr. Nixon.”

“We saw the public man in his first administration and we were impressed,” the Tribune Editorial Board wrote on May 9, 1974. “Now in about 300,000 words we have seen the private man and we are appalled.”

“His country needs a swift and merciful termination of this agony,” the editorial concluded.

On Aug. 9, Nixon resigned. He climbed aboard the presidential helicopter and turned around to face the White House. He smiled gamely, gave a final flash of V for victory, and was gone.

“The text contains incomplete sentences, sequences that cannot be understood, and confusing syntax. This is the natural result of a full transcription of informal conversation and, of course, it cannot be avoided. The Tribune is publishing the transcript exactly as it was obtained from White House sources, with no additions or deletions. The President’s transcript summary has been omitted. He has offered ranking House members access to the tapes."

[whatwillthegirlbecome]

ROBERT BLY GETS UP EARLY

Michael Dennis Browne

At the ticket counter, Minneapolis Airport, 7.30 am, standing in line -- a hand on my shoulder! It is Robert Bly! Risen like a silo from out of the dark earth for one last greeting.

He is flying to Boston to read. Flying to Boston with a satchel of red bees. "I have red bees in my bag. I will have no hesitation in releasing them into your unconscious."

Robert Bly! Organic Foods! White Poncho! Vitamin E!

I get on my plane, sit down with Esquire, The New Yorker, and Greek Lyric Poetry. I reach for my notebook to write down a few bad lines about Robert Bly unexpectedly putting his hand on my shoulder so early in the morning at the airport -- when a man sits down beside me -- it is Robert Bly!

This plane goes to Pittsburgh but he has charmed his way harshly past the stewardesses. He flies simultaneously to so many places in his head, why should he not think that the Pittsburgh plane will take him also to his reading in Boston -- perhaps even directly to the podium!

What does this manic Son of Norway want of me? He shoves a small blue book into my hands. It is by a young Norwegian poet who is traveling around the country in a Greyhound Bus with his girlfriend.

Do we have money, he asks? His eyes crackle with the luster of Vitamin E.

O Robert Bly, you are on this earth only briefly, like an angel with a hangover. I see you striding, wings folded, across the main lobby of the Minneapolis International Airport, pushing a vast plow. Out of the sliced floor streams a flood of soldier ants, Latvian attorneys, centurions, phantoms, admirals, minor poets with half-opened parachutes. They flow out of the airport and into the landscape, determined to turn the country around.

O Robert Bly, get off my plane! I have two readings of my own to do in Pittsburgh!

Robert Bly hurtles to gate 7a with his satchel of bees. He gets on his plane -- at last! He needs no charm now -- he has a ticket! From deep in the poncho he releases a bee. The bee makes his way forward into the cabin, crawls up onto the pilot's shoulder, and croaks into his ear: "Take this plane to 4th-century Tibet."

[247londonairporttransfers]

The World's Top Five Airport Casinos

Some airports now offer special gambling areas where you can play slots, gamble on roulette, and play card games. You have never believed gambling could take place in such congested areas like airports. They're always packed, chaotic. 

Still, there are certain advantages to gambling in airports. To begin with, airport casinos are tax-free. You keep whatever you earn in the airport, because gambling games also belong to duty-free zones. 

Reno-Tahoe is home to one of the top airport casinos in the world. The Nevada International Airport welcomes visitors with a large and engaging gambling area of approximately 4.100 square ft. 

Pittsburgh, another American city, has a good airport casino that covers a huge area. While waiting for their trip, travellers can play a variety of slot machines. Because slots require little space and have no dealers, they seem like a fair choice for a gambling zone in such a popular location. Fans of poker and roulette, on the other hand, will not be disappointed when they visit Pittsburgh.

Rivers Casino, one of the largest land-based casinos in the US, is located in the city. It has over 2900 slot machines, 100 table games, a 30-table poker room, numerous restaurants, and live entertainment. The casino is 24 hours and in general it is one of the best states to visit for gaming.

Heathrow is London's busiest airport. Despite the fact that the popular UK airport lacks a full-fledged casino, gamblers may find slot machines all over the waiting hall, flight zone, and other areas. 

Years ago, Schiphol Airport in the Netherlands certainly had one of the top airport casinos in the world. Gamblers who travelled to the capital to try their luck initially arrived at Amsterdam's main international airport. Unfortunately, the Schiphol casino was removed in 2018 and Amsterdam West Casino was opened in its place.

In Nevada, Elko Regional Airport is another place with a casino nearby. This airport, unlike others, does not have a gaming zone but does provide a shuttle service to the nearest casino. 

247london-airport-transfers.co.uk

[malkkins-blog]

sometimes goodbye is a second chance

The news of the lockout comes as a surprise, but it means that Geno won’t be forced to make a decision on a timeline. He wants to play hockey, he wants to be with Sid on the ice in Pittsburgh but he doesn’t know if he’s ready to come out yet. ship: sid/geno words: 2.2K ao3 A/N: this is my first sid/geno fic so any constructive criticism is welcomed. also the italics is what is said in russian.

August

It’s the middle of the night, the sun has been gone for hours and Geno can’t seem to stop twisting and turning. He doesn’t know what’s going on with him, but he can’t help but think that it’s about Sid’s recent inquiries. Sid wants them to come out and Geno’s not quite sure if he could handle all that entails for him. He knows that Sid has very little to lose, he’s still great on the ice and his parents will adore him no matter what, while neither of them really care what the league believes- they’re too valuable for their sexual orientation to be any sort of issue.

It’s not the same for Geno. He has a lot to lose.

He’s from Russia, which means coming out risks his place on the Olympic roster, his ability to go home, to see his parents and Dennis- he’s getting married next year and Geno needs to be there. His parents know that he’s dating Sid, they have for the past three years, but it’s still awkward between the three of them whenever the topic comes up.

Geno signs. He sits up and throws the comforter off of him before he quietly goes downstairs to the living room. He settles into the couch, staring at the darken television while he tries to figure out what he wants to do. Geno tries not to focus on the pictures that line the mantel next to him, but he can see them out of the corner of his eye. All of them are Sid and Geno together, his favorite is the one closest to the corner armchair, to the untrained eye, it looks like they’re hugging, but in that moment, Sid is kissing his neck, whispering what he wants to do to him once they’re back home in Pittsburgh. The picture next to it is from the day they adopted their German Shepard, Dixie- Sid had called it their first family photo.

With a soft grunt, he pulls out his laptop and quickly books a ticket on the next flight to Magnitogorsk. He needs to get away, time to clear his head. His decision would be easy here, in their home together, where moments of their lives together litter every room of their house. He needs to be reminded of what he’s going to give up by agreeing to it.

He doesn’t go to sleep that night. After the confirmation flashes across his screen, he quietly goes back upstairs and disappears into the closet, packing his road trip bag by randomly grabbing the first clothes he can finds. He might even grab bits and pieces of Sid’s clothes, all of their items are intermixed nowadays. He hides the bag in the back of the closet and lays back down next to his boyfriend.

He looks down, Sid looks so happy and content while he’s sleeping. His eyelashes rest against his cheeks and Geno wants nothing more than to lean down and kiss them, the way that his curls spreads across the pillow that makes Geno want to run his fingers through it, but he settles for a light kiss on Sid’s forehead before getting under the covers and pretending to be asleep once Sid’s alarm rings at 7:45 on the dot.

They spend the day together, Sid’s oblivious to the knowledge that once he goes to sleep, Geno won’t be there.

That night, Geno presses a soft kiss to Sid’s forehead, pats Dixie’s head, and then calls a cab to pick him up from the neighbor’s address. He doesn’t want anyone to know that he’s leaving, so taking his car to the airport was out of the question. He quickly sends a text to his Mama ‘I’m coming home’ before turning his phone off. He’s aware that in a few hours, Sid will be blowing up his phone before enlisting the rest of his teammates.

He goes through check-in and security without being recognized, which is a plus but at three in the morning, the Pittsburgh International Airport is relativity empty and Geno has a hat pulled over his eyes. Once he’s settled into his seat on the plane, he quickly falls asleep. He dreams of Sidney, of their life together. He wakes with a jolt as the plane touches down in Russia- he turns his phone on, it flooded with texts from Sid, Flower, Tanger, Horny, and even a few rookies, but he ignores all of them, trying to find the one from his Mama. He sends her another text saying that he just touched down and he’ll be home soon. While waiting for the plane to taxi into the gate, he takes the time to change his phone background- it was a photo of Dixie and Sid, both of them curled up on the couch while Sid rested from the concussion he suffered during the series against the Capitals. He looks at it long enough to want to go back home, but he quickly changes it to the Pens logo and turns it back off.

September

The news of the lockout comes as a surprise, but it means that Geno won’t be forced to make a decision on a timeline. He wants to play hockey, he wants to be with Sid on the ice in Pittsburgh but he doesn’t know if he’s ready to come out yet. Geno hasn’t given himself any time to really think or talk about it. Natalia keeps pressing him about it, keeps asking why he’s come home so close to the start of the pre-season but Vladimir refuses to listen to any talks about Sid so Geno keeps his mouth closed and spends time at his old club, taking on a small coaching job.

It’s a night while Vladimir is at work that Natalia finally get her son to open up. Geno tells her all about how Sid wants them to come out, how Geno is so scared about the backlash that would come from both his father and his country, how he wants to keep his spot on the Olympic roster because he’s Russian through and through and he doesn’t know what he would do if he can’t play for his country.

“Do you love him?”

“Yes.”

“Does he make you happy?”

“Yes.”

“Does he make you happier than Russia?” The question stumps him, it’s the entire reason he’s come to Russia, to figure out if he could give up home to be with Sidney.

“I don’t know, Mama. That’s why I’m here.”

Natalia sighs and picks up her son’s dinner plate and starts to clean it. “I want you happy, little bear.”

“Hockey make me happy. Sid make me happy. Russia make me happy.”

“You can’t have all three. Hockey and Sid or Hockey and Russia. You’ll always have hockey, no matter which you chose.”

He wants to say the conversion helps, but in reality, it only complicates things. He wants all three, he wants Hockey, Sid, and Russia.

October

Sid only texts him once a week now and Geno never answers, but he always reads them. Sid mostly texts only about Dixie now, about how she still runs around the house looking for her Papa but sometimes, it’s Sid asking to at least text him and tell him that he’s okay. Geno feels bad, he shouldn’t have left like he did, but he didn’t know another way to do it. Today, Sid had sent a picture of Dixie in their closet, laying on top of one of Geno’s jerseys. Geno misses her, he knows that much, and he misses Sid, but he still not sure.

He knows that Sid would be there for him, no matter what Russia said to him, that Sid would hold him while he cried and would tell him that Russia is who is losing by banning him, but it doesn’t comfort Geno as much as he thought it would. He knows that Russia isn’t someone he can come home to, someone who can support him and hold him and love him, but he could always find someone in Russia who did.

But who would love him like Sidney does?

It’s a daily struggle, and each day it’s getting harder and harder to see the end line. Geno knows that lockout is going to end soon and he’s going to have to face Sid, either to break his heart or to tell him that he means more to Geno than his homeland- he still doesn’t know that answer.

November

He’s planning for New Year’s already, planning on going out with friends from his childhood-like he’s going to be here in late December. He doesn’t want to think about the end of the lockout, about the fact he will have to go back to Pittsburgh at some point.

Natalia is still yelling at him every chance to go home and makeup with that boy. He gets a text at least once a day from a teammate, telling him how upset Sid is, about how he hasn’t left the house since Geno left, how he needs to come home.

Geno feels alone.

It’s a new thing. It felt it when he first moved to Pittsburgh, but it’s nothing he’s felt recently. He hasn’t known anyone who has been in his position before, torn between the love of his life and his country. He will figure this out, just not this month.

December

It’s almost Christmas when he get a text from Sidney. It’s the first one in nearly a month- Geno was starting to get worried he was going to forget about him. It’s a picture of the Christmas tree, set up where they’ve had it every year since moving in together, in the corner where the armchair goes. Dixie lays at the base of it, chewing on a toy that Geno hasn’t seen before, and Sid’s feet are resting on the coffee table. Geno stares at the photo- trying not overanalyze it, but it does notice that their picture are still up on the mantel- he can see the cup picture in the corner of the photo.

He misses Sid.

Sid still thinks he’s coming back.

Geno doesn’t respond- just like the hundreds of texts before hand, but he does go downstairs to find Natalia.

“I go home.” He states upon entering the kitchen, where she’s making dinner.

“You are home, little bear.”

“No. Pittsburgh, home. Sid, home.” Natalia nearly drops the potatoes she’s peeling to look at her son.

“Are you sure?”

“Yes.”

Natalia throws her arms around her youngest son, holding him close to her. She knows that this might be the last time she sees him, the last time that she gets to hold him in her arms.

“I love you.” Geno presses a kiss to the top of her head.

“I love you too.”

December 24th

It’s Christmas Eve and maybe landing back in Pittsburgh on this day was bad planning on his behalf, but he wants to be back home for Christmas, so here he is, in the freezing cold, standing on his own doorstep, trying to find the courage to knock. Once he finds the ability to move his hand, he rings the doorbell, listening to Dixie’s barking as she inevitably runs towards the front door in an effort to find out who is breaking the silence of the house. It’s early, Geno knows that, but he’s not sure if Sid’s awake yet, what if Sid’s asleep and he’s forced to stand out---

“G?” Sid said as he rubs his eyes in an effort to try and wake up. Once Sid is able to look up with both eyes, he wraps his arms around Geno’s neck, pulling him as close to him as possible.

“I sorry, Sid, I so sorry.” One of them is crying, and Geno’s not sure which one of them it is. He drops his bags and pulls Sid even closer to him, reminding himself of what he missed for five months. “I love you. Love you much.” He can feel Sid nod against his chest and Geno just holds him for even longer.

Neither of them says, do or move for what feels like hours, but eventually, the cold gets to both of them and Sid pulls Geno into the house- their house. It’s the first time Geno’s gotten to look at Sid. He looks awful. He hasn’t shaved in what looks like months, he’s lost weight, hasn’t kept up with his normal workout routine and definitely hasn’t been on the ice for at least two weeks.

Sid pulls him into the living room and it looks just like the picture Sid sent- everything looks the same as it did when he left. They both settle into the couch, sitting hip to hip but Geno knows that they need to have this conversation before tomorrow.

“Why?” It’s the only word Sid has said since Geno arrived home, but it’s the only one he needs to say.

“Got scared. Knew that if you want to come out I choose between you and Russia.” Sid looks over at him, his eyes wide as he takes in the reason the Geno left so quickly.

“G, no, you don’t have to- we don’t have to come out.” Geno holds up his hand, taking a deep breath while he did so.

“I choose you. I choose Sid. Russia don’t love me like Sid love me.”

The get the phone about the lockout being over two weeks later and they come out after their home opener that season.

[artificialqueens]

We've Got Tonite (Jivy/Shalaska/Trixya/Pearlet) Part 5: Epilogue - Saiphl

A/N: So… we finally reached the end of this story, thanks to all of you who took the time to read it and give it some space and love.

Particularly, I guess this is my favorite part of the whole fic, so I hope you enjoy it as much as I enjoy it since it was taking shape inside of my mind.

Part 5:  Because I feel just the same for you

It had been almost a year from that far, far away night, all those months had been such a twister… lots of work, full bookings and the whole expectation created around the new season that had been broken by the announcement in the #NNNAwards, everything turned to madness, the fans waiting, the full gigs, the beginning of the new Battle of the Seasons tour, that started early in 2016.   Violet was about to give her crown to a new reigning queen and say the goodbyes to that amazing year that gave her so much to be grateful at.

The Austin-Bergstrom International Airport was full of people, some of them departing, some of them arriving and some others waiting to see those faces they were missing, and there, there’s where does this story come to the end, on the arrivals gate of international flights, where a very impatient Violet was tapping her long fingers on a table, making nervous an already anxious Katya, who beat down the moving fingers “please… stop it, you’re making me wish to cut off your fingers bitch”, Violet gave a bitchy smile to Katya, who was sighing deeply, looking at the arrivals screen on the wall.  

Sharon joined them some minutes later, coming back from having a smoke out, bringing with her Ivy and Jinkx, that were having one of those pointless discussions about the comfortability of wedges and stilettos.

Call it coincidence or Fate, the flights they were waiting for were arriving with some minutes of difference, and as far Katya and Violet had been in Texas for a couple of days now, they thought that pick their sisters at the airport shall be nice for one time.  When the arrival screen changed, showing the first landing, Katya almost jumped with excitement, taking the sign written with red lipstick half smeared letters “PLASTIC WHORE”, giving Jinkx the one with black letters that said “MISS TINY BUTT” and handing to Violet the last one with the royal blue letters “SLEEPY NERDIST”.

“And now please come with me let confusion fade away.

I can’t stand waiting. I can’t stand waiting.”

Ivy and Jinkx were holding the sign together, just the way they have been doing almost everything for the last year, even when their bookings had been full, and many of the gigs weren’t coincident, they found a way to keep it going together, as the best friends they had become… as the lovers they were.  Proudly, they wore a couple of beautiful and discreet golden wedding rings, that they exchanged back in november, when they finally figured out that they were not able to be apart.

They were still so in love and so happy to be together, that they had almost forgotten how hard everything turned after that night on the Stage 48, they knew for sure they were meant to be together but they still had to do one more thing.  When Ivy went back to Michigan, she wasn’t alone, Jinkx was there, holding her hand and encouraging her to be brave and give Keith the deserved apologies and closure for their time together… that was such a hard time and by the saying of the both of them, it totally worthed for what they got being together.

A month later, the house in Michigan were put on sale and Ivy moved temporarily to Seattle, where she and Jinkx created the foundation of what a couple of months later, became the Hoffer-Winters Manor in uptown New York.

By the time they were holding the sign on Austin Airport, they hadn’t been at their home for a while, but they were serious to say that home were wherever they were, as far as they were together, keeping each other in their hearts.  When Alaska finally put her long legs out the gate, pulling her luggage, Ivy and Jinkx smiled at her, making her feeling the welcome home warmth that made her heart run real fast.

Dustin and Jerick didn’t know for sure what will destiny’s call be, but they both were sure that they would be able to face anything if they keep holding hands and trusting each other, ‘cause for them, love was about that: support and trust.

“And read down inside the deepest

Corners of my open soul.”

After Alaska got strong hugs from Ivy and Jinkx, she stood right in front of Sharon, who looked at her, with that crooked smile of her, they took a couple of steps to each other and got entangled in a tight hug, one that made Alaska felt relief when she realized that it didn’t hurt anymore, it actually was great to hug and be hugged by Sharon, who went back to be her best friend again, her partner in crime, and the person she could trust the most.

That morning, when Courtney caught them together at the hotel room, they showered together, having some sexy and funny time, it was some like the old times when they were together, but this time was better, ‘cause they had grown up and found that gladly, the old bruises had been healed, and there were no need to miss each other, as far as they could be together as friends.

“So… you’re here”, Sharon said to Alaska, who answered with a high pitch on her voice “if you didn’t want me to come to your gig, you should have told it girl… I could be back at Pittsburgh”.

Sharon faked an affected expression and then started laughing when Alaska bursted on laughing at her face

“As told… such a talker, and a cheater”, Alaska said to Sharon and they got embraced again.  

Aaron and Justin just found a way back to each other, but this time, complying the promises they made, they had actually established some kind of routine of texting a couple of times a day, asking for the brutal honesty they always had with each other, and also to share the good things of a day, or just to be weird in a way that no one else could understand.  

They both finally got the missing part of their souls, knowing for sure that they will always love each other, but they were much better being apart and they were in peace with that.

“I used to call you my treasure

But now you’re my new religion”

Katya started bouncing when she saw Trixie coming through the arrivals gate, she always felt really excited when she was about to meet her again, they managed to find a way to share good quality time, most of it while they were sharing bookings along US and Europe, they still haven’t decided if Katya would move to LA anytime sooner, or if Trixie would move to Boston…

They actually avoided to talk about it, ‘cause it always leaded to a pointless discussion that used to end with one of them wrapped around the other, attempting to convince one another to change their minds.

Trixie was really tired, there was something about the commuting that made her feel tired as hell, she was yawning when her eyes caught a glimpse of her Katya, bouncing and holding that red sign calling for some plastic whore and a wide smile spreading across her lips.  Something in her heart melted almost immediately.

Behind that russian whore character, Brian McCook was actually the kindest person that she had ever met, and he loved his Brian like there were no other human being all over the world that worth more than him and every single thing that could give them a couple of minutes together.

The both of them started jogging, trying to keep themselves calmed, but as soon as they came close, Katya jumped into Trixie’s arms, and gave her a hungry and deep kiss, that were interrupted by Sharon’s raspy voice.

“Excuse me ladies, but if you want to make it to the show tonight without getting jailed, you should stop making out that way”.

“C’mon bitch, I haven’t seen my Bri for three tortuous miserable weeks, let me kiss my man while I can”  Katya answered, making that whiny voice that Trixie loved so much.

Trixie kissed Katya’s forehead , and both of them smiled goofily at each other, maybe they couldn’t find if they wanted to live in Boston or LA, maybe they could spend most of their nights together spooning, like the first time they got official… maybe they were just a complicated set of lovey doveys, but they loved each other with everything they were.

Back in time, in the months that followed the crowning party, they agreed on being low profile about their relationship, but as it’s well known, love and money are the most difficult things to hide, and both of them were maybe the worst liars over the world, so the next morning when everyone was about to say their goodbyes, all their drag queen sisters, actually knew that they were together, and even when Katya tried to deny it, she fell under her own anxiety, and were caught by Max being kissed by Trixie on her room’s door.

They didn’t care a lot of their pointless discussions about the advantages of moving to LA or Boston, or if they were into dog adoption, they were happy with being together and as Katya always said to Trixie when she was about to lose it, “one step a day”.

“Wherever my love is written

For you only you is right to know”

Violet was almost shaking when Pearl finally came through the arrivals gate, all in black with a grey beanie and her black framed glasses; they locked gazes immediately, like if the gravitational forces of the earth made them impossible for the both of them to find each other in less than a second.  

Pearl gave a shy smile, while Violet sighed losing her breath at the time she saw the other queen smiling: Violet always loved that little goofy smile of her.  Pearl just sped up to Violet, even ignoring that “Sleepy Nerdist” thing that Violet was holding and as far as she got close to her, ended straight over between the knees of the both of them when they finally hugged tightly.

It has been almost a year since the last time they saw each other out of drag, almost a year since the last time they were that close.  A couple of weeks after the crowning party, all the commitments and bookings were too much, and as much they craved each other, Pearl made the decision of letting Violet go, the last night they shared, there was rage, pain, lust and two broken hearts.

When Violet felt Pearl’s body against hers, couldn’t help to shiver at those last memories of them together, they had the worst discussion they’ve ever had and were getting it solved the only way they understand very well: angry sex.  While Matt was on top of her, Jason saw the hurt on Matt’s eyes, the loneliness and the worst of all the things she had ever seen on those beautiful blue eyes: defeating, so he understood that Matt wouldn’t be able to go through that year without ending attempting to kill them both or to break up in a way worst than Sharon and Alaska’s, and he couldn’t bear that; so she decided to let him go.  

They said their goodbyes with the promise of being faithful to each other as much as they could and to talk about all of that whenever they felt ready to do it.  Pearl was in Mexico City when her cell phone rang, showing Violet’s face on the screen, they didn’t spoke a lot, one single ‘I love you’ and one single ‘I do love you either’ was more than enough to meet at Austin few months later.

“You’re back, Boo”, Violet whispered at Pearl’s ear, all shaky and barely containing all the emotions overwhelming her.

“Gigs apart, it’s been almost a year Pumpkin… we still need to talk” said Pearl, landing her hand over Violet’s lower back.

Few seconds later, Violet broke the embrace just to look straight to Pearl’s eyes, she thought that her memory didn’t pay a fair tribute to the clear beauty of those pale blue eyes, a single tear slid down Violet’s cheek, a single tear that was wiped with the tip of Pearl’s nose, attempting to get out of that tension, she said in a low voice “are we going to take this from where it was the last time, baby?”.

“If we take this from where it stood the last time, honey you’ll have to fuck me on some hidden spot of this airport… and I don’t think that it will go anyway good as we should be caught”, then she greeted Matt with that secret smile, that they both knew as the prelude of a great night of sex.

“Better to take it from the scratch… nice to meet you, I’m Matt, and you are?”  Pearl teased Violet, who changed the sassy smile for an amazed expression, to finally give her a sweet appreciative look and a flattery smile.

“I’m Jason, pleased to meet you and I’m sorry if this is too forward… but you’re really hot”, Violet cupped Pearl’s cheek with one hand, and the both of them started laughing, to finally kiss each other’s lips.

“Ok lovey doveys, time to go back to the hotel, it’s not that I really care, but almost all of you have a gig to perform and entertain my tiny butt and the Plastic Whore’s” Alaska announced, breaking the moment between them “so come on, bring those asses to the parking lot, and get the hell out of here”.

Violet took Pearl’s free hand on hers, and started walking with her, following Ivy and Jinkx to the parking lot, she tightened the grip, making sure that was Pearl’s hand what she was holding, and Pearl looked at her by the corner of her eye “but… we still have to talk”, she remarked

“However you want girl… I’m done with this let’s give it time, space and some land in between… I’m done being away for you”, Violet said making herself a statement.

“Please follow straight the way that will lead you

To read me deep inside cause I love you.”

As all the eight of them walked out from the Airport, in a very unique way, they found that one night can change everything not just for being a night, but for being the open door to choose within the comfortable safe side, or to give a leap of faith and start believing in US, instead or Me, You or We.

“I used to call you my treasure

But now you’re my new religion

Because I feel just the same for you.”

[we-arnold-lockshin-blog]

Dictatorship USA – A Plundering and Predatory Nation  — 2018 (100)

Факты, которые  подконтрольные ЦРУ  СМ»И»  в России скрывают...

The Pittsburgh Synagogue Shooting Wasn’t An Aberration

HuffPost, Oct. 29, 2018

I understand what Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Wolf was trying to do with his statement immediately following Saturday’s mass murder at Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh. When he said, “These senseless acts of violence are not who we are as Americans,” he was saying that this horrific event ― a hate-fueled massacre of innocents in an American house of worship ― does not reflect our national character.

But here’s the problem: It is who we are. Or, at least, a large part of who we are.  Gov. Wolf’s line is a statement of fantasy, not fact.

This attack was fueled by religious prejudice. And we are a nation with hate and prejudice encoded in its DNA. Read about the three-fifths clause of the Constitution, or the slaves who helped build the White House and U.S. Capitol. Study virtually anything about this nation’s treatment of Native Americans. Brush up on the Chinese Exclusion Act or Japanese internment or anti-LGBTQ+ violence. Go to the newly opened National Memorial for Peace and Justice, which honors “thousands of racial terror lynching victims in the United States,” or read about the spike in anti-Semitic incidents in recent years. This is who we are.

We are also a nation that glorifies guns. Today, there are more than 390 million civilian-owned firearms in the U.S., which is enough for every man, woman and child to own one and still have 67 million guns left over.  In 2016, 37,000 people died in this country from gun violence, second in the world behind Brazil. This is who we are.

Our gun obsession and refusal to significantly regulate firearms have led to a string of mass shootings in almost every conceivable public place: nightclubs, elementary schools, high schools, community colleges, state universities, military bases, supermarkets, airports, nursing homes, Planned Parenthood clinics, cafes, IHOPs, Waffle Houses, coffee shops, malls and hotels. There have been more than 100 of these events (indiscriminate rampages in public places resulting in four or more victims) since 1982, and Saturday’s attack wasn’t the first mass shooting at a religious site in recent memory. Think of the 2012 attack at a Sikh Temple in Wisconsin, or Charleston in 2015, or Sutherland SpringsTexas, where, less than a year ago, 26 people lost their lives in a Baptist Church.

The Pittsburgh shooting wasn’t even the only act of hate-fueled violence last week. On Friday, the FBI arrested a suspect in a hate-fueled mail bombing campaign. The shooting of two African Americans by a white man in a Kentucky supermarket earlier in the week is now being investigated as a hate crime. This is who we are.

We boast about our freedom while locking people up at a higher rate than any other country. We talk about our superior quality of life while we face more than a trillion dollars in student debt, stagnant wages, and dropping life expectancy.  We excel at delusional self-flattery.

Hatred and violence and firearms are deeply embedded in our national psyche. For the sake of you, me, and everyone else in this country, I wish this weren’t true ― but that’s different from saying it isn’t true.

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Перед нами сейчас -  коварный и опасный мошенник, расист, лжец и фашист Дональд Трамп, порочный Конгресс, нацистские ФБР - ЦРУ,  кровавые милитаристы США и НАТО >>> а также и лживые, вредоносные американские СМ»И».

/////////////////////////////////////////////

Правительство США жестоко нарушало мои права человека при проведении кампании террора, которая заставила меня покинуть свою родину и получить политическое убежище в СССР. См. книгу «Безмолвный террор — История политических гонений на семью в США» - "Silent Terror: One family's history of political persecution in the United States» - http://arnoldlockshin.wordpress.com

Правительство США еще нарушает мои права, в течении 14 лет отказывается от выплаты причитающейся мне пенсии по старости.  Властители США воруют пенсию!!  

ФСБ - Федеральная служба «безопасности» России - вслед за позорным, предавшим страну предшественником КГБ, мерзко выполняет приказы секретного, кровавого хозяина (boss) - американского ЦРУ (CIA). Среди таких «задач» -  мне запретить выступать в СМИ и не пропускать большинства отправленных мне комментариев.   А это далеко не всё...

Арнольд Локшин, политэмигрант из США

BANNED – ЗАПРЕЩЕНО!!

ЦРУ - ФСБ забанили все мои посты и комментарии в Вконтакте!

… и в Макспарке!    

[so-chlo-blog]

Texture + Other Fashion Apps

From the time I was in middle school and pouring over issues of J-14 and TigerBeat, I have been a big fan of magazines.  I don’t subscribe to any particular publications, partly because of financial limitations, and partly because it’s more exciting for me to pick and choose random magazines here and there as I see them in grocery store checkout lines, airports, and drugstores. With that being said, magazines are expensive. Spending five or six dollars on a Vogue here and there isn’t a big deal, but picking up a hefty copy of The Gentlewoman and seeing a price tag for seventeen or eighteen dollars hurts me a little bit. So when the concept of the app “Texture” was presented to me, I was immediately intrigued. And even better yet, I got to try a whole week of unlimited access to full copies of so many magazines for absolutely free.

When I downloaded Texture, the first step was to sign in and “favorite” some magazines that I wanted access to. This was really exciting for me, because instead of having to choose between two different types of magazines like I usually have to do when purchasing one, I had all different types of publications at my fingertips. From fashion to food to interior decorating, I was so excited to explore all the different magazines.

However, over the course of a week with Texture on my phone, I found that I wasn’t using it as much as I had hoped I would. This reminded me of another reason I don’t subscribe to any magazines or buy them very frequently: I don’t have very much time to read them. Texture is great, but I don’t think it would be worth the money for me to have the app full-time. Furthermore, I realized that I didn’t like reading these magazines on my phone screen as much as I did from a physical, hard copy. I’ve never been a big electronic reader, and I immediately felt like the magic of opening a magazine and flipping through its glossy pages was lost through my phone screen.

Another really important thought I have about magazines is this: more often than not, when I make a magazine purchase, it’s because there is a particular issue of a publication that is really special and meaningful for me. For example, Marie Claire included a profile of Project Runway winner and one of my all-time favorite humans ever, Erin Robertson, in 2017. National Geographic published a special Pablo Picasso issue a few months ago. These particular issues are really special to me, and therefore I want to own physical copies of them and keep them where I can see them. Having access to the content on my phone would be really great, but that doesn’t satisfy the part of me that wants to own the magazines and be able to physically hold them and see them.

Turning the page to the topic of fashion apps, one of my all-time favorites is Polyvore. I have been using Polyvore’s services since I was young, and I recently got to use it on a professional basis for an internship that I had over this past summer. I was the “fashion and style intern” for a vintage clothing company called CHC Vintage (located in Pittsburgh but offered online; check them out!), and one of my roles was to take dozens of style icons from the last fifty or so years and create visualizations of modern style based on theirs. Polyvore was the easiest and most fun way to do this, and as a result I had dozens of style boards based on Twiggy, Audrey Hepburn, and Stevie Nicks that would appeal to any and all modern women.

Another fashion app that I think is great is The Hunt. The number of times that I have been in search of a particular shoe, clothing item, or bag but been unable to locate it is so frustrating. I love that The Hunt is full of people who can help you find exactly what you’re looking for, and at the right price, too. Finally, I also love the concept of Stylebook. Every time I travel, I love making lists of what clothes I’m going to bring so that styling outfits out of my suitcase is easy and fast. I’m a planner by nature, and Stylebook makes the process even more fun.

I am currently interning with Bobbie Thomas, who is a style and beauty editor for the NBC Today Show. Part of my role in the office with Bobbie is to help her plan outfits that she will personally wear for TV segments, as well as outfits to dress models in for the show. I know that Bobbie does not currently use Polyvore, but I think the app would be really useful and beneficial for the work she does. Ultimately, the very best way to prep for a TV segment is to try on all the clothes, but Polyvore would make the planning and shopping experience so much easier than working off of screenshots from websites. Not only is Polyvore a fun app to mess around with, but it’s also actually very useful.

[touristguidebuzz]

JFK Airport’s Terminal Setup Contributed to the Storm-Recovery Fiasco

Passengers near baggage claim at JFK Airport Terminal 4 during the January 6-7 weekend. The airport had trouble recovering from a snow storm last week. David Grossman / MilesTalk.com

Skift Take: Most of the world's airports have lots of "common-use gates" that can be used by any carrier. Not JFK. It operates under a different model, and that has been a big problem over the past week.

— Brian Sumers

Even as it became clear that last week’s bomb cyclone in New York would be as bad — or perhaps worse than expected — many international flights were already on their way to New York John F. Kennedy International Airport, dispatched hours before by airlines gambling that they’d make it.

Usually it works out. The weather clears, and the plane that left Taipei or Hong Kong 15 hours earlier lands without incident. That’s often true even when domestic airlines like JetBlue Airways or American Airlines cancel many of their flights because airports tend to find a way to accept long-haul arrivals over the flight from Buffalo, New York.

But that’s not what happened at JFK. Instead, the airport closed for a longer-than-expected period on Thursday afternoon into Friday morning, and long-haul flights had to go to Chicago, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, or even Newburgh, New York, sometimes at airports not prepared to accept them.

When flights were cleared to return to JFK, things got worse, and the airport is still dealing with the fallout. The airport, the fifth-largest in the United States by passenger count, was not prepared for the onslaught of flights all arriving at roughly the same time from the diversion airports. There were not enough gates for the arriving jets, and planes blocked each other on taxiways, causing traffic jams.

Passengers became testy, and airline employees often didn’t have much information. Airlines didn’t know for sure when they would get a gate, or when passengers would be reunited with their luggage. The entire airport was a mess well before Sunday, when a water main broke at Terminal 4, spewing water into the arrivals area,

Now that the airport has resumed mostly normal operations, the finger pointing is beginning. Why was the meltdown so great? And what’s the airport operator — the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey — planning to do about it?

“What happened at JFK was completely unacceptable and we will investigate what went wrong and prevent it from happening again,” Port Authority Executive Director Rick Cotton said.

JFK Operates Differently

But as passengers have learned recently, JFK doesn’t operate like a typical U.S. airport, and that may make it difficult for the Port Authority to ensure there’s no repeat of recent events.

At many airports, the airport operator is in complete control as both a terminal landlord and controller of some, or all, of the gates — especially the ones used by international carriers with only one or two flights a day. But that’s not how it works at JFK. Instead, one airline, groups of airlines, or private operators control each terminal and the gates.

That’s why American Airlines, which controls Terminal 8, has had relatively few problems over the past week. It was prepared for the poor weather, managed its gate space effectively, and kept its few international tenants, including Qatar Airways, running smoothly.

At Terminal 1, operated jointly by Air France, Lufthansa, Japan Airlines and Korean Air, it was different. The terminal, which also handles Aeroflot, Air China, Norwegian Royal Air Maroc and Turkish Airlines, which pay rent, had nowhere near enough gate space to accept all the diverted arrivals, as well as the regularly scheduled flights that came in between Thursday or Monday.

And even when flights had gates, airlines didn’t always have enough workers to unload bags, part of a problem the Port Authority blamed on, “frozen equipment breakdowns, difficulties in baggage handling, staff shortages, and heavier than typical passenger loads.”

Bad weather will almost aways cause friction at an airport. At a typical airport, an airline that couldn’t get into Terminal 1 might receive help from the airport operator to go to an open gate at another terminal. But that’s difficult at JFK, because each terminal has its own owner and only accepts airlines that pay it for gate space.

With no available gates on Saturday at Terminal 1, when the airport was otherwise open, and when American operated 70 of its 79 departures from Terminal 8, some JFK flights were not permitted to land, including Royal Air Maroc 200 from Casablanca, which instead went to Philadelphia. Some arrivals on Sunday and even Monday were also delayed to ensure “adequate gates for arriving flights,” mostly at Terminals 1 and 4, according to the Port Authority.

At the request of the Port Authority and the terminal operators, the FAA is limiting some flights into JFK, including all flights scheduled to arrive into Terminal 1 for the rest of the evening. 5/7

— Port Authority NY&NJ (@PANYNJ) January 6, 2018

The Port Authority has promised to improve in the future, but it’s not clear exactly how it will do so, since it does not control the terminals.

“The Port Authority will aggressively examine the coordination and preparation by airlines, terminal operators, and Port Authority staff to assure, in particular, that international flights not experience international gate congestion similar to what occurred this weekend,” it said.

The Port Authority is also promising to investigate Sunday’s apparently cold-weather related water main break at Terminal 4, used by by 34 carriers, including Delta Air Lines.

But there, too, the airport doesn’t control the facility. In 1997, Terminal 4 became the first privately owned terminal in the United States, according to its website. It’s now owned by Schiphol USA Inc., part of the Schiphol Group, which controls Amsterdam’s main airport.

Still, the Port Authority is talking tough. In its statement, in addition to promising an investigation, it said three airlines in Terminal 4 — Air India, Etihad, and Emirates — were not doing enough early this week to help passengers. Officials told the airlines their rebooking operations were “unacceptable and must be improved.”

[kansascityhappenings]

Power restored at Atlanta airport but travelers will feel the pain for days

Watch Video

ATLANTA — While power has been restored to the world’s busiest airport, the travel woes will linger for days.

Thousands of people were stranded Monday morning at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport, where more than 1,000 flights were grounded just days before the start of the Christmas travel rush.

A sudden power outage that Georgia Power said was caused by a fire in an underground electrical facility brought the airport to a standstill Sunday about 1 p.m.

All outgoing flights were halted, and arriving planes were held on the ground at their point of departure. International flights were being diverted, officials said.

Delta Air Lines, with its biggest hub in Atlanta, will be hardest hit. By Sunday evening, Delta had already canceled nearly 900 flights and another 300 Monday, nearly all of them in Atlanta, according to tracking service FlightAware.com.

Robert Mann, an aviation consultant and former American Airlines executive, said it likely will be Tuesday before Delta’s operations in Atlanta return to normal, and for passengers “it could be most of the week” because there aren’t many open seats on other flights in the last week before Christmas.

One bit of good news, according to Mann: Delta has more spare planes and available crews in Atlanta than anywhere else, which should help it to recover.

Delta customers flying to or from Atlanta can make a one-time change to travel plans without incurring a $200 change fee. The airline also encouraged travelers not to pick up their bags Monday because of anticipated congestion at the airport.

Still, when flights at Atlanta were grounded for most of one day last spring, it took Delta five days — and about 4,000 canceled flights — before it fully recovered.

Like Sunday’s outage, that April storm hit Delta’s largest hub at a busy travel time when there weren’t many empty seats to accommodate customers from cancelled flights. At the time, CEO Ed Bastian vowed Delta would make “significant improvements” to its system for scheduling and tracking aircraft crews to recover more quickly from disruptions.

Other airlines also canceled flights for the rest of Sunday. American Airlines canceled 24 departures and an equal number of arrivals, said spokesman Ross Feinstein. The airline also diverted three planes that were headed to Atlanta when the outage struck, sending them instead to Dallas, Nashville and back to Philadelphia.

The city of Atlanta provided shuttle service to the Georgia Convention Center on Sunday for travelers needing a place to stay.

Delta passenger Emilia Duca, 32, was on her way to Wisconsin from Bogota, Colombia, when she got stuck in Atlanta. She said police made passengers who were in the baggage claim area move to a higher floor. She said restaurants and shops were closed. Vending machines weren’t working.

“A lot of people are arriving, and no one is going out. No one is saying anything official. We are stuck here,” she said. “It’s a nightmare.”

Some passengers said there was a lack of information from airport officials and little help from first responders to get the disabled and the elderly through the airport without the use of escalators and elevators.

“They had these elderly people, handicapped people lined up in wheelchairs,” said stranded passenger Rutia Curry. “The people were helpless, they can’t get down the stairs. It was just a nightmare.”

Passenger James Beatty said there was no real method for evacuation.

“I mean there was 40 or 50 people per the terminal area that were confined to wheelchairs and some that couldn’t get through the airport very well, some of them actually couldn’t walk and there was no plan at all to get them out of here without any power.”

Beatty said passengers carried those who used wheelchairs down stairs.

The FAA said it would staff the airport control tower throughout the night so it could handle flights once they resume. The FAA said the tower could operate normally but flights were affected because airport equipment in the terminals was not working.

According to a Georgia Power statement, the utility believes a piece of equipment in an underground electrical facility may have failed, causing the fire. The fire was next to equipment for a backup system, causing that to also fail.

“No personnel or passengers were in danger at any time,” the statement said.

No areas outside of the airport were affected by the power loss. The utility said there are “many redundant systems in place” to ensure the power supply to the airport and that such outages at the airport “are very rare.”

Anthony Foxx, who served as U.S. transportation secretary under former President Barack Obama, tweeted that he was among the many travelers stuck for hours on a plane on the tarmac.

“Total and abject failure here at ATL Airport today,” he tweeted, adding that there was “no excuse for lack of workable redundant power source. NONE!”

In another tweet, Foxx said it seemed like the problem was “compounded by confusion and poor communication.”

Once he was off the plane, Foxx tweeted that he hoped to rent a car to drive to Charlotte, North Carolina, to catch a flight Monday morning.

Sara Melillo and her husband, Greg Presto, were traveling from Kenya, where they live, to Pittsburgh to spend Christmas with his family when they were stuck on the tarmac for six hours. The couple had made stops in Nairobi and Amsterdam and landed shortly after the lights went out in Atlanta.

Melillo said the pilot didn’t have a lot of information for the travelers but the plane had air conditioning and attendants offered water and juice a few times. She described the Delta terminal as “big chaos” with not enough customer service for the hundreds of people trying to find a flight to their next destination and a place to sleep for the night.

With her new boarding pass handwritten and her bags still stuck on a plane, Melillo was hopeful that she and her husband would be able to get a flight in the morning to Pittsburgh, she said as she waited for an Uber ride to a hotel. But in a Monday morning email, Melillo told The Associated Press the morning flight had been rescheduled to the evening and they were going to the airport to try to get a different flight.

Airport workers were distributing bottled water, and Dunkin’ Donuts was giving out doughnuts. Chick-fil-A, which is usually closed on Sundays, opened to provide meals for travelers, according to the airport’s Twitter feed.

Officer Lisa Bender of the Atlanta Police Department said officers were at the airport to help with crowd control and managing traffic around the airport.

At Southwest Airlines, about 70 Atlanta departures out of 120 scheduled for Sunday were canceled, an airline spokesman said in an email. United Airlines and JetBlue Airways were among carriers reporting delays or cancellations.

American Airlines reported only a handful of diversions and cancellations because the carrier does not use Atlanta as a hub, airline spokeswoman Alexis Aran Coello.

Hartsfield-Jackson, which serves 104 million passengers a year, is the world’s busiest airport, a distinction it has held since 1998.

The airport serves an average of 275,000 passengers daily, according to its website. Nearly 2,500 planes arrive and depart each day.

from FOX 4 Kansas City WDAF-TV | News, Weather, Sports http://fox4kc.com/2017/12/18/power-restored-at-atlanta-airport-but-travelers-will-feel-the-pain-for-days/

from Kansas City Happenings https://kansascityhappenings.wordpress.com/2017/12/18/power-restored-at-atlanta-airport-but-travelers-will-feel-the-pain-for-days/

[rollinbrigittenv8]

The Airport Lounge Business — An Insider’s View of How It All Works

Airport Lounge Development runs The Club at SJC, a shared-use lounge in San Jose, California. Premium passengers from many international airlines can use the lounge for free. Airport Lounge Development Inc.

Skift Take: Airport lounges are rarely luxurious, but people love them. Perhaps they crave access to an "exclusive" airport club. So look for more to open soon at U.S. airports. As we learn in this interview, operating a lounge can be a profitable business.

— Brian Sumers

Editor’s note: This series, called Airline Insiders, introduces readers to behind-the-scenes decision-makers for airlines. Unlike our ongoing airline CEO series, Future of the Passenger Experience, we will not question the highest-ranking executives here. Instead, we will speak with insiders who guide decisions on airline operations, networks, marketing, and the passenger experience. 

Today, in the fifth installment of the series, we speak to an executive for a company that develops and manages airport lounges. 

You can read all the stories in the series here.

Few things excite casual travelers as much as an airport lounge with free pretzels, cookies and — often — mediocre beer, wine and spirits.

Lounges are rarely as luxurious as marketing materials suggest, and even the nicest ones suffer from two basic problems— passengers are rough on the furniture, and greedy at the buffet and the bar. Directly or indirectly, they’ve paid for access, and many do not treat the space as delicately as their living room.

Still, lounges usually are more comfortable than the terminal. And increasingly, especially in the United States, they’re becoming more popular, as more travelers apply for credit cards that include membership in Priority Pass, a network of more than 1,000 lounges worldwide. Travelers with many high-end credit cards from American Express, Chase, Citibank and Bank of America get a free membership, allowing free airport club access.

Priority Pass doesn’t own or operate any lounges. Instead, it has contracts with existing clubs, paying the operator a fee each time a Priority Pass member enters. Sometimes, these are airline-branded lounges — some Alaska Airlines and Virgin Atlantic clubs participate — but more often they’re not affiliated with any carrier.

For independent lounge operators, such as Texas-based American Lounge Development, Priority Pass’ newfound popularity is great for business. The company, owned by Collinson Group, a privately held UK firm, operates 15 U.S. lounges — most called “The Club” — as well as two in London. In the United States, they’re in Boston, Pittsburgh, Cincinnati, Orlando, Seattle, San Jose and Baltimore, along with several other cities.

Priority Pass members are not the company’s only revenue stream. It also caters to major international airlines, including British Airways and Japan’s ANA, giving their premium customers a place to relax while waiting for a flight. With Collinson’s lounges, the airlines might have to build their own clubs — an expensive proposition for a carrier with only one or two flights a day. In addition, customers without Priority Pass or a premium-class ticket may pay $40 to use a club.

That creates steady revenues and keeps Nancy Knipp, senior vice president at Airport Lounge Development, busy. Knipp, a former managing director at American Airlines, where she managed Admirals Clubs and worked for more than 30 years, helps the company manage lounges and determine where to expand.

We spoke to Knipp recently to learned more about her job, and the trend of third-party operated airport lounges.

Note: This interview has been edited for length and clarity. 

Skift: Let’s start with numbers. Major international airlines, including British Airways, and ANA, use some of your U.S. lounges. How do they pay? Is it an overall price? Or do they pay per head?

Nancy Knipp: Generally it’s negotiated at per-guest cost and that per-guest cost varies based on location. A lot of what influences that per-guest cost is the type of menu the airline wants because we also tailor our food service for when that airline is in the lounge. British Airways may want a certain type of cuisine, where maybe Japan Airlines or an ANA would want a different type of food. Or they may want some culturally different food options, such as halal or kosher foods.

We price it out based on what the airline requirements are, primarily from food and beverage, but when the guest comes in, we register them as a visitor coming from, say, British Airways or ANA, and then at the end of each month we invoice and bill that airline.

Skift: How much is an airline paying per head?

Knipp: We prefer not to answer because each of those contracts are confidential. But you can buy access for $40 if you’re just a customer off the street, so clearly it’s going be much below that. We’re not going to charge the carrier the same price we would for a single customer. That gives you an idea of where it would be. It is a very reasonable cost for what the carrier is looking for.

Skift: And every time I bring my Priority Pass card into one of your lounges, does Priority Pass pay you? Or is there an overall deal?

Knipp: All of our agreements are per guest. For every guest that comes in, there’s a payment that comes directly to us as the lounge operator and then whether it’s split with the airport or not depends on the agreement with the airport.

Skift: So you’ll sometimes split revenues with airports?

Knipp: It depends. We can work with airports on a little bit of a different model. What we will do is we will share a percentage of our revenues with the airport so then they get the benefit as we grow our customer audience. As that lounge becomes more popular with the travelers or with the airlines, our guest [numbers] go and up and as our guest [numbers] go up, then the value and revenue to the airport goes up.

Skift:  I’ve heard smaller airports want you to build lounges in their terminals, including Pittsburgh. Why’s that so important for them?

Knipp: Well, for a couple of reasons. One, the demand for shared-use lounges has gone up significantly in the last few years. That demand is driven by several things, [including] growth from the credit card companies with their embedded lounge access programs. There are thousands of customers in the concourse who have these credit cards and they want to find a lounge. That demand is putting pressure on the airports to say, ‘Hey, we need a lounge for this customer audience.’

As well, airports are trying to attract new airlines, whether it’s an international carrier or even other domestic carriers who don’t have their own lounges. In order for an airport to grow in some cases, they have to have a lounge. San Jose, California is a great example. San Jose has grown with a number of new international carriers and one of the key components of that was that they had a lounge available that they could use. When we first started in San Jose, I think there was one airline that we took care of, ANA, and now I think we handle six or seven.

Overall, if you look at the whole focus of airports, everyone wants to improve that guest experience. They’re increasing and enhancing the concession and retail side. They want to have something that’s going be attractive to customers to be at the top of the scoring list when it comes to what the customer says about your airport.

The last key driver is the airports are looking to increase revenues. They want new and different concessions. Well, as a shared lounge provider — because we give them a percentage of our revenues — that increases concession revenues, but it doesn’t necessarily take away from concession real estate. We can have a lounge up on the mezzanine where most stores don’t want to be. That way airports can use that portion of their real estate and get some good revenues out of it, even though it’s not a store or a restaurant.

Skift: Your company is growing, but we still don’t see many non-airline operated lounges in the United States. Do you expect that to change?

Knipp: Most certainly. We are seeing it right now. We’re talking to at least probably 10 different airports. They’re all interested in having a lounge and the demand is there. What’s preventing it from the immediate growth is the lack of real estate. There are several airports that we’ve talked to that have said, ‘As soon as we can figure out where to find some real estate, we want a lounge.’ That’s the biggest challenge, but the demand is going to continue to grow. We could have up to 30-plus lounges, if not more, in the U.S.

Skift: Priority Pass has been around for awhile. But it has only recently become part of a credit card arms race. Now almost every travel-centric credit card comes with a membership. That must be great for business, right?

Knipp: It is pretty good, I’ll have to say. I think Priority Pass had agreements with the major financial institutions such as an American Express, Visa, Master Card for several years now. But the Chase Sapphire Reserve came out about a year ago with lots of benefits, one of which, of course, was lounge access. Our guest volumes have grown significantly. If you’re a consumer and you’ve got one of those cards in your pocket, you want to make sure you’re getting a good value out of it, so the lounge has been a good value for the consumer and for us.

Skift: Do you consider the American Express Centurion lounges in airports as a competitor? Or is it not because that club is only tied to one credit card? 

Knipp: We get asked that question a lot. American Express customers also have access to our lounges [through Priority Pass], so they’re not really a competitor. We complement each other. If there’s not enough room in a Centurion Lounge because there’s such a high demand, those customers have the option to come over to our lounge. We don’t really want to think of them as a competitor because we’re there to help their customers, and we handle all of the other credit card [holders] that can’t go into their lounge.

Skift: With so many people eligible to use your lounges, you must have some overcrowding issues. Beyond expanding your lounges, how do you deal with it?

Knipp: We’ve learned some tricks, like the kind of seating that will help get more efficiency. If you have a table with four chairs and a table, you might get one, possibly two people sitting at it. That’s not very efficient. We do more banquet seating with different tables lined up in front, or we do more communal tables where people can work on their laptops.

Then the other thing is we started testing this hostess program, which has been extremely successful and, just as an example, we use in Atlanta. Atlanta is probably our busiest lounge, and it certainly has high-peak demands. We have nominal, if any, declined passengers or guests that come into Atlanta and that’s because we help pull their luggage aside, we help them find seats, and we help them rearrange seating if we need to. We’re trying to be very proactive, even our busiest lounge, to avoid declined seating.

Skift: Do you find guests who have paid $40 try to eat or drink their way back to even? 

Knipp: There can be that. Sometimes people want to make sure they’re getting the most that they can out of lounge. It comes back down to the traveler. You’ve got travelers who do it so often, and they’re the road warriors. They’ve been there, done that, and they’re most interested finding a place to relax and take it easy.

If you have someone coming in that maybe has never used a lounge — they’ve gotten it as a gift or what have you — they’re probably more inclined to try everything, or have a couple more drinks than they normally would or take a couple more plates of the food than they normally would.

It balances itself out. Sometimes we get customers that don’t eat or drink anything. They really just want to come in and use the restroom. A key component of lounges is, do you have a clean restroom and some place I can sit and put my feet up?

Skift: What’s the most unusual food or beverage request an airline has made? Do they want a certain type of wine, or food? Has it been tough to find anything?

Knipp: We were asked to have pizza in one of our lounges by a European airline. You’d think they would want a certain wine or a [high-end] cuisine, yet they wanted pizza. This was for a fairly premium European airline and they were flying into Vegas. We thought it was an interesting request because that doesn’t seem like something you’d normally have in a premium lounge. But we took care of that.

We get asked for Japanese cuisine, noodles, thing like that, halal offerings, kosher offerings, but the pizza was probably the most unusual.

Skift: Is there a risk sometimes that you’ll put out food so popular you cannot keep up with demand?

Knipp: There are things that can happen like that. Sushi is a good example. People seem to love sushi. I think the perception of the health side of it plus the freshness of it and so on is something that can be challenging. It’s also something that can be expensive because it’s not one of the cheaper items that you can purchase. So fish can be one of those items.

Skift: Do you have tricks to make sure people don’t put snacks in a to-go bag to eat later?

Knipp: There are a few tricks. Some of it just has to do with staffing. You have to have people that are there, making sure the buffet is kept up and they’re helping out to keep things clean and they’re assisting guests with questions. People are less likely to [take items] if someone is standing there helping clean and helping get things organized.

You’ve got to manage it in a way that the guest feels comfortable, and you can control your costs, but they still can enjoy the product without it being rationed out.

Skift: Is it as simple as putting a bowl of potato chips out versus individual bags?

Knipp: You do less prepackaged stuff — that’s part of it — but I will tell you I’ve seen people take scoops of items off the buffet and put it in their own bag. I’m talking about a plastic bag filled with jelly beans or a plastic bag filled with popcorn, not necessarily talking about putting it in your luggage bag.

In my past life, we had to-go bags because we sold food in the lounge and I happened to be sitting on the aircraft and I saw one of our to-go bags coming down on the aisle and I thought, ‘Well that’s really neat. There’s a to-go bag, so somebody bought something in the lounge.’ When the customer got next to me, I saw it was completely full of the pretzel mix that had been in the machine. They had just filled the to-go bag with pretzel mix for their family. I kind of laughed to myself and went, ‘Well, it isn’t exactly the purpose of it, but OK.’ What are you going to do?’

[cheapfaresnews]

Pittsburg Airport Opens Its Gates to Non-flyers

Most would be travelers are pleased by the wide variety of cheap travel options they have to choose from including cheap airplane tickets, discount hotel rooms, and cheap vacation packages.  However, some older travelers yearn for the good old days when passengers’ families could bid them farewell or greet their arrival at their airline gates.

Everything changed after 9/11, with only ticketed passengers being permitted past airport security checkpoints.

The Pittsburgh International Airport has figured out a way to allow a friend or family member to walk right out to the gate and give a hug, a kiss, or a balloon to loved ones as they exit a plane after a long flight or board flights.

Non-ticketed people, as of September 5th, have been given access to gates, shops, restaurants, and artwork located beyond the security checkpoints year-round with the approval of the Transportation Security Administration (TSA).

Before passing through airport security they will need to check in at a special desk, show a valid government issued photo ID (Driver’s License or Passport), and have their names checked against No-Fly lists.  They will then be issued a “myPITpass.”  After obtaining this pass guests will proceed to go through screening at security checkpoints same as airline passengers.

Currently passes will only be issued Monday through Friday from 9 am to 5 pm and will be valid only for the day they are issued.  These times were selected to avoid the busiest times at the airport and at security checkpoints.  If security lines become long, people seeking a myPITpass will have to wait until the lines slow down.

While the TSA has express support for the myPITpass program, it has noted that the agency has not had to hire any additional staff because of the program.  Although TSA does not expect the myPITpass program to negatively impact checkpoint wait times, there are no plans to expand the program at this time.

There are a number of reasons for someone not flying or meeting other fliers may want to get a pass and spend time on the secure air side of PIT airport.  There are shops and restaurants not available elsewhere in the city, such as Armani, Bar Symon, Hugo Boss, Tumi, and others.  The airport is also home to a high-quality art collection that displays a giant Alexander Calder mobile, Andy Warhol works, and a new center core terrazzo floor that depicts iconic Pittsburgh neighborhoods.

www.cheapfares.com

[btsburgh]

Chapter 4

They were all sitting in the back of a black SUV, feeling very out of place in probably the nicest car they had ever been in in their lives.

"There's chilled bottles of water in the mini cooler." The driver said, "Feel free to help yourself."

"Oh." Jungkook reached over and opened the mini fridge, helping himself to a bottle of water. Namjoon shot him a look and he mouthed, "What?"

"No, it's fine. Just take water from a stranger." Namjoon reprimanded in a hushed voice.

"So ... how do you know Bria?" Jordan called the to trench coat wearing man up front.

"We do business together sometimes." He responded with a chuckle.

"If that's what you like to call it." Bria laughed, "This guy is the best croquet player in Pittsburgh. Nobody plays a clutch poison ball like him."

"Aw, don't flatter me. Bria is my number one customer for black market photocards so she's just talking me up."

Tawni leaned over to Jordan, "I feel like that gave me more questions than answers."

Jordan agreed.

"We have a big problem." Namjoon sighed, "Take off has been moved up a couple minutes. I don't know what we're going to do. We can't possibly get through security in time."

"What if ..." Jungkook shook his head, "No that's stupid."

Namjoon rolled his eyes, "We survived two car crashed I think everything is kinda stupid so pitch it."

"They can't take off if ... something stalls them." Jungkook said slowly.

Namjoon narrowed his eyes, "You're not saying ..."

"I am." Jungkook nodded, "It's our only option."

"Okay. Make the call.”

———

Jimin picked up the phone, "Hey, it's the guy who was born in Busan before you, what's up?"

"I hate you Jimin." Jungkook said from the other side of the line, "I need your help."

"Yeah when are you guys getting here?" Jimin nodded to Hobi who settled into the aisle seat on the row across from them where Yoongi and Jin were already sitting.

"Uhh ... soon hopefully. But not soon enough." Jungkook admitted.

"What are you saying? You're going to miss the plane?"

"No. Not if you guys could ... stall for some time."

Jimin paused. His eyes gently swept over to Hoseok who was untangling his headphones from his pocket and settling in for the flight. He responded somberly, "Are you saying what I think you are?"

There was a bit of silence on the line before Jungkook spoke, "We need it."

"Understood." Jimin ended the call.

He looked over the aisle to Hoseok who caught his gaze.

"What?" Hoseok asked, raising his eyebrows.

Jimin gave him a serious look, "It's time."

———

The SUV was going quite fast. Bria was sitting up front with her mysterious friend while everyone else was in the oddly spacious car back. Jungkook was sipping on one of the water bottles he had gotten out of the cooler while Namjoon sat, anxiously tapping his foot and biting on his finger.

Jordan was probably still playing an eighth play through of Stayin Alive in her mind.

"We're not gonna make it." Namjoon mumbled.

"You have to quite worrying." Jordan consoled him.

"We're going so slowly." Namjoon shot back.

"Don't snap at me." Jordan rolled her eyes.

Bria calmed their fears from the back, "Don't worry ... I know a guy."

Just then the deep tinted windows became a little less black and they saw that they were no longer on 376-W towards the airport. In fact, nobody had any idea where they were at all. They were passing a bunch of people in various military uniforms and colored suits. They glanced into the car as they passed through serious looking buildings and even more serious looking cars.

"How many guys does she know?" Tawni whispered.

———

Hoseok and Jimin hadn't been gone to the bathroom long when the cabin lights suddenly dimmed and something came over the speaker system that wasn’t their captain nor any of the plane staff.

“Good morning, ladies and gentlemen.” Came the telltale voice of one Jung Hoseok.

Jimin followed after him, “We’d like to invite you to a little pre-flight entertainment.”

“Brought to you by the world famous Bangtan Boy’s Dance Line.”

“Everyone, please put your hands together, for …”

a low bass track came over the loud speakers, and everybody else seemed just as confused and disoriented as the rest of said Bangtan Boys were. The low bass track grew louder and oddly familiar as lights came out of nowhere to focus two circles on the front of the plane.

“The BTSendales!” Hoseok and Jimin shouted, appearing out of the bathroom suddenly, wearing sparkly red suits buttoned up and looking like they had managed to get a full face of make-up on in their short time in the tiny one person bathroom.

The track suddenly became what we all know as Get Low by the wonderful artist know as Lil Jon and the East Side Boyz.

They began to strut up the center aisle of the plane to the track, pausing to throw winks and kisses to various people who were sitting in their seats just trying to catch a flight to Chicago. Without a moment of hesitation, they brought into a perfectly choreographed dance, moving side to side as they made their way up and down the aisles. They undid their ties and tossed them to one woman who seemed particularly excited about how her flight was going right now.

“Excuse me!” A flustered flight attendant appeared, patting at Jimin’s shoulders to try and get him to stop, “You can’t do this, sir. We have to take off and you’re delaying the flight.”

“Hey!” Jimin called, “Our first audience participation.”

“No! No, audience participation. Please.”

He turned back to her and reached for his lapel, yanking at it and undoing the strip of velcro that kept his suit jacket together (as opposed to the usual buttons) and pulled it off one shoulder fully to reveal himself to be entirely shirtless minus the suit jacket on just one arm.

The flight attendant looked at him, “Oh boy.”

———

“I can assure that all of the people on board are not aliens.” The Trench coat wearing driver assured a third military looking man.

He glanced back at all of them gruffly, nothing that each of them looked quite anxious and confused, but not necessarily extraterrestrial. He stared for what was in no way a sensical amount of time before eventually nodding.

He stepped back from the car and motioned them to head inside to the tunnel. Once they were inside it began to get darker, and darker, and darker and darker.

In fact they were eventually in total blackness.

“I love this.” Bria commented, “It’s my favorite part.”

Nobody had the heart to respond as they continued to drive forward into the pitch blackness with no lights to guide this car. Perhaps the driver knew the way. Perhaps they actually died at Sheetz and this is just the afterlife.

But then they saw a light, it was just above them.

“Alright.” Bria nodded, “This is it. Thanks, Jebediah.”

The driver nodded as she got out of the car. The four friends in the back all looked around to where they assumed the other ones were since it was too dark to tell, and just stumbled to their feet, reaching along the wall of the huge SUV until the found the handle to the door.

Eventually Namjoon managed to open the door and he and Jordan piled out. It didn’t take Jungkook too long to find the opening either.

“Tawni.” He said, “Here.”

“I have terrible spatial awareness.” Tawni muttered, “I don’t know where you are.”

Jungkook reached out into the darkness and found her hand, taking it tightly, “Come on.”

Tawni swallowed the lump in her stomach as she followed him out of the car.

Once outside they all stepped into the light coming from the ceiling. It was obvious that they were all worse for wear. They looked around the circle. Jungkook had a cut on his forehead that the make up people were going to hate him for tonight. Tawni had a scarp on her elbows from bracing herself against the seat. Namjoon’s hair was a radical mess and Jordan was holding onto Namjoon’s shoulder to keep herself from blacking out after standing up too quickly.

“Okay, it’s time.” Bria called into the darkness, “Jocasta, we’re ready.”

No verbal response came from the blackness, but suddenly the floor shifted beneath them, beginning to raise them up to the light. It took a couple seconds for everyone to get their footing, but that was just enough time for them to get to the top, where they realized they were in fact just outside of the Pittsburgh International Airport.

———

Hoseok glanced over to Jimin who had just finished giving some now passed out girl an almost lap dance. They had managed to dance their way into only wearing the shorts they had on beneath their pants and they were starting to sweat. If anything else happened, the fan sites would surely find pictures of it, whitewash them, then post them before they could even set foot in Chicago.

“Where are they?” Hoseok hissed.

Jimin shrugged, nudging a twenty dollar bill somebody had hysterically thrown at him.

“Here!” Namjoon burst into the plane, holding his boarding pass up, “I’m here.”

“Oh thank god.” Jimin and Hoseok immediately darted into the bathroom, taking split seconds to change.

Namjoon turned and called over to Jungkook who was talking to Tawni just passed the security check point, “Come on, kookie! We gotta go right now!”

He looked over his shoulder and started to back up, “Tawni.”

“Yes?”

“Add me on snapchat.” He smiled, “Please.”

She held her phone up and used snapchat to snap his snap ID and add him as a snap friend. It was such a touching moment that a tear welled up in her eyes, “When will I see you again?”

Jungkook started to jog away from her, “Soon!”

[touristguidebuzz]

The Airport Lounge Business — An Insider’s View of How It All Works

Airport Lounge Development runs The Club at SJC, a shared-use lounge in San Jose, California. Premium passengers from many international airlines can use the lounge for free. Airport Lounge Development Inc.

Skift Take: Airport lounges are rarely luxurious, but people love them. Perhaps they crave access to an "exclusive" airport club. So look for more to open soon at U.S. airports. As we learn in this interview, operating a lounge can be a profitable business.

— Brian Sumers

Editor’s note: This series, called Airline Insiders, introduces readers to behind-the-scenes decision-makers for airlines. Unlike our ongoing airline CEO series, Future of the Passenger Experience, we will not question the highest-ranking executives here. Instead, we will speak with insiders who guide decisions on airline operations, networks, marketing, and the passenger experience. 

Today, in the fifth installment of the series, we speak to an executive for a company that develops and manages airport lounges. 

You can read all the stories in the series here.

Few things excite casual travelers as much as an airport lounge with free pretzels, cookies and — often — mediocre beer, wine and spirits.

Lounges are rarely as luxurious as marketing materials suggest, and even the nicest ones suffer from two basic problems— passengers are rough on the furniture, and greedy at the buffet and the bar. Directly or indirectly, they’ve paid for access, and many do not treat the space as delicately as their living room.

Still, lounges usually are more comfortable than the terminal. And increasingly, especially in the United States, they’re becoming more popular, as more travelers apply for credit cards that include membership in Priority Pass, a network of more than 1,000 lounges worldwide. Travelers with many high-end credit cards from American Express, Chase, Citibank and Bank of America get a free membership, allowing free airport club access.

Priority Pass doesn’t own or operate any lounges. Instead, it has contracts with existing clubs, paying the operator a fee each time a Priority Pass member enters. Sometimes, these are airline-branded lounges — some Alaska Airlines and Virgin Atlantic clubs participate — but more often they’re not affiliated with any carrier.

For independent lounge operators, such as Texas-based American Lounge Development, Priority Pass’ newfound popularity is great for business. The company, owned by Collinson Group, a privately held UK firm, operates 15 U.S. lounges — most called “The Club” — as well as two in London. In the United States, they’re in Boston, Pittsburgh, Cincinnati, Orlando, Seattle, San Jose and Baltimore, along with several other cities.

Priority Pass members are not the company’s only revenue stream. It also caters to major international airlines, including British Airways and Japan’s ANA, giving their premium customers a place to relax while waiting for a flight. With Collinson’s lounges, the airlines might have to build their own clubs — an expensive proposition for a carrier with only one or two flights a day. In addition, customers without Priority Pass or a premium-class ticket may pay $40 to use a club.

That creates steady revenues and keeps Nancy Knipp, senior vice president at Airport Lounge Development, busy. Knipp, a former managing director at American Airlines, where she managed Admirals Clubs and worked for more than 30 years, helps the company manage lounges and determine where to expand.

We spoke to Knipp recently to learned more about her job, and the trend of third-party operated airport lounges.

Note: This interview has been edited for length and clarity. 

Skift: Let’s start with numbers. Major international airlines, including British Airways, and ANA, use some of your U.S. lounges. How do they pay? Is it an overall price? Or do they pay per head?

Nancy Knipp: Generally it’s negotiated at per-guest cost and that per-guest cost varies based on location. A lot of what influences that per-guest cost is the type of menu the airline wants because we also tailor our food service for when that airline is in the lounge. British Airways may want a certain type of cuisine, where maybe Japan Airlines or an ANA would want a different type of food. Or they may want some culturally different food options, such as halal or kosher foods.

We price it out based on what the airline requirements are, primarily from food and beverage, but when the guest comes in, we register them as a visitor coming from, say, British Airways or ANA, and then at the end of each month we invoice and bill that airline.

Skift: How much is an airline paying per head?

Knipp: We prefer not to answer because each of those contracts are confidential. But you can buy access for $40 if you’re just a customer off the street, so clearly it’s going be much below that. We’re not going to charge the carrier the same price we would for a single customer. That gives you an idea of where it would be. It is a very reasonable cost for what the carrier is looking for.

Skift: And every time I bring my Priority Pass card into one of your lounges, does Priority Pass pay you? Or is there an overall deal?

Knipp: All of our agreements are per guest. For every guest that comes in, there’s a payment that comes directly to us as the lounge operator and then whether it’s split with the airport or not depends on the agreement with the airport.

Skift: So you’ll sometimes split revenues with airports?

Knipp: It depends. We can work with airports on a little bit of a different model. What we will do is we will share a percentage of our revenues with the airport so then they get the benefit as we grow our customer audience. As that lounge becomes more popular with the travelers or with the airlines, our guest [numbers] go and up and as our guest [numbers] go up, then the value and revenue to the airport goes up.

Skift:  I’ve heard smaller airports want you to build lounges in their terminals, including Pittsburgh. Why’s that so important for them?

Knipp: Well, for a couple of reasons. One, the demand for shared-use lounges has gone up significantly in the last few years. That demand is driven by several things, [including] growth from the credit card companies with their embedded lounge access programs. There are thousands of customers in the concourse who have these credit cards and they want to find a lounge. That demand is putting pressure on the airports to say, ‘Hey, we need a lounge for this customer audience.’

As well, airports are trying to attract new airlines, whether it’s an international carrier or even other domestic carriers who don’t have their own lounges. In order for an airport to grow in some cases, they have to have a lounge. San Jose, California is a great example. San Jose has grown with a number of new international carriers and one of the key components of that was that they had a lounge available that they could use. When we first started in San Jose, I think there was one airline that we took care of, ANA, and now I think we handle six or seven.

Overall, if you look at the whole focus of airports, everyone wants to improve that guest experience. They’re increasing and enhancing the concession and retail side. They want to have something that’s going be attractive to customers to be at the top of the scoring list when it comes to what the customer says about your airport.

The last key driver is the airports are looking to increase revenues. They want new and different concessions. Well, as a shared lounge provider — because we give them a percentage of our revenues — that increases concession revenues, but it doesn’t necessarily take away from concession real estate. We can have a lounge up on the mezzanine where most stores don’t want to be. That way airports can use that portion of their real estate and get some good revenues out of it, even though it’s not a store or a restaurant.

Skift: Your company is growing, but we still don’t see many non-airline operated lounges in the United States. Do you expect that to change?

Knipp: Most certainly. We are seeing it right now. We’re talking to at least probably 10 different airports. They’re all interested in having a lounge and the demand is there. What’s preventing it from the immediate growth is the lack of real estate. There are several airports that we’ve talked to that have said, ‘As soon as we can figure out where to find some real estate, we want a lounge.’ That’s the biggest challenge, but the demand is going to continue to grow. We could have up to 30-plus lounges, if not more, in the U.S.

Skift: Priority Pass has been around for awhile. But it has only recently become part of a credit card arms race. Now almost every travel-centric credit card comes with a membership. That must be great for business, right?

Knipp: It is pretty good, I’ll have to say. I think Priority Pass had agreements with the major financial institutions such as an American Express, Visa, Master Card for several years now. But the Chase Sapphire Reserve came out about a year ago with lots of benefits, one of which, of course, was lounge access. Our guest volumes have grown significantly. If you’re a consumer and you’ve got one of those cards in your pocket, you want to make sure you’re getting a good value out of it, so the lounge has been a good value for the consumer and for us.

Skift: Do you consider the American Express Centurion lounges in airports as a competitor? Or is it not because that club is only tied to one credit card? 

Knipp: We get asked that question a lot. American Express customers also have access to our lounges [through Priority Pass], so they’re not really a competitor. We complement each other. If there’s not enough room in a Centurion Lounge because there’s such a high demand, those customers have the option to come over to our lounge. We don’t really want to think of them as a competitor because we’re there to help their customers, and we handle all of the other credit card [holders] that can’t go into their lounge.

Skift: With so many people eligible to use your lounges, you must have some overcrowding issues. Beyond expanding your lounges, how do you deal with it?

Knipp: We’ve learned some tricks, like the kind of seating that will help get more efficiency. If you have a table with four chairs and a table, you might get one, possibly two people sitting at it. That’s not very efficient. We do more banquet seating with different tables lined up in front, or we do more communal tables where people can work on their laptops.

Then the other thing is we started testing this hostess program, which has been extremely successful and, just as an example, we use in Atlanta. Atlanta is probably our busiest lounge, and it certainly has high-peak demands. We have nominal, if any, declined passengers or guests that come into Atlanta and that’s because we help pull their luggage aside, we help them find seats, and we help them rearrange seating if we need to. We’re trying to be very proactive, even our busiest lounge, to avoid declined seating.

Skift: Do you find guests who have paid $40 try to eat or drink their way back to even? 

Knipp: There can be that. Sometimes people want to make sure they’re getting the most that they can out of lounge. It comes back down to the traveler. You’ve got travelers who do it so often, and they’re the road warriors. They’ve been there, done that, and they’re most interested finding a place to relax and take it easy.

If you have someone coming in that maybe has never used a lounge — they’ve gotten it as a gift or what have you — they’re probably more inclined to try everything, or have a couple more drinks than they normally would or take a couple more plates of the food than they normally would.

It balances itself out. Sometimes we get customers that don’t eat or drink anything. They really just want to come in and use the restroom. A key component of lounges is, do you have a clean restroom and some place I can sit and put my feet up?

Skift: What’s the most unusual food or beverage request an airline has made? Do they want a certain type of wine, or food? Has it been tough to find anything?

Knipp: We were asked to have pizza in one of our lounges by a European airline. You’d think they would want a certain wine or a [high-end] cuisine, yet they wanted pizza. This was for a fairly premium European airline and they were flying into Vegas. We thought it was an interesting request because that doesn’t seem like something you’d normally have in a premium lounge. But we took care of that.

We get asked for Japanese cuisine, noodles, thing like that, halal offerings, kosher offerings, but the pizza was probably the most unusual.

Skift: Is there a risk sometimes that you’ll put out food so popular you cannot keep up with demand?

Knipp: There are things that can happen like that. Sushi is a good example. People seem to love sushi. I think the perception of the health side of it plus the freshness of it and so on is something that can be challenging. It’s also something that can be expensive because it’s not one of the cheaper items that you can purchase. So fish can be one of those items.

Skift: Do you have tricks to make sure people don’t put snacks in a to-go bag to eat later?

Knipp: There are a few tricks. Some of it just has to do with staffing. You have to have people that are there, making sure the buffet is kept up and they’re helping out to keep things clean and they’re assisting guests with questions. People are less likely to [take items] if someone is standing there helping clean and helping get things organized.

You’ve got to manage it in a way that the guest feels comfortable, and you can control your costs, but they still can enjoy the product without it being rationed out.

Skift: Is it as simple as putting a bowl of potato chips out versus individual bags?

Knipp: You do less prepackaged stuff — that’s part of it — but I will tell you I’ve seen people take scoops of items off the buffet and put it in their own bag. I’m talking about a plastic bag filled with jelly beans or a plastic bag filled with popcorn, not necessarily talking about putting it in your luggage bag.

In my past life, we had to-go bags because we sold food in the lounge and I happened to be sitting on the aircraft and I saw one of our to-go bags coming down on the aisle and I thought, ‘Well that’s really neat. There’s a to-go bag, so somebody bought something in the lounge.’ When the customer got next to me, I saw it was completely full of the pretzel mix that had been in the machine. They had just filled the to-go bag with pretzel mix for their family. I kind of laughed to myself and went, ‘Well, it isn’t exactly the purpose of it, but OK.’ What are you going to do?’

[rollinbrigittenv8]

Pittsburgh Airport Is Letting Non-Ticketed Visitors Through Security to Make the Place a Destination

Pittsburgh International Airport is letting visitors past security to shop, eat, and meet or drop off loved ones at the gate. Cocoabiscuit / Flickr

Skift Take: As long as the non-ticketed visitors don't add to wait times for passengers, this sounds like a good opportunity to boost revenue and customer satisfaction while keeping security precautions in place. But it would be hard to see the idea working at airports that deal with bigger crowds and smaller spaces.

— Hannah Sampson

Whether or not you’re getting on a plane, you may soon be able to get in a TSA line — just to eat the pulled pork mac ’n’ cheese at Iron Chef Michael Symon’s namesake restaurant in Pittsburgh International Airport (PIT).

Thanks to a new program starting on Sept. 5, non-fliers will be allowed to roam beyond security at PIT as part of a test the airport developed with the Transportation Security Administration’s sign-off. Visitors who check in at a dedicated counter on the airport’s third-floor ticketing level and show a driver’s license or passport can receive a complimentary “myPITpass.” Anyone on the no-fly list will not be allowed, and everyone will still have to go through TSA’s standard security procedures—just like travelers with a regular boarding pass.

For the first time since Sept. 11, 2001, parents of unaccompanied minors and the children of traveling elderly at the Pennsylvania hub will be able to see them to the gate and keep them company until boarding.

“This is one of the top five requests I get any time I give a speech,” said Christina Cassotis, chief executive of the Allegheny County Airport Authority, which oversees PIT. “This is a very unique community in that you have a lot of meeters and greeters, people who drop off and pick up loved ones,” she told Bloomberg.

For Cassotis, the move signals “a return to the good old days” before 9/11, when anyone could show up with flowers to pick someone up from the gate.

But a lot has changed since the good old days. For one thing, security requires far more thorough screenings. And whereas PIT was built as a major hub for US Airways, it now operates as an “origin and destination airport,” where people begin and end their journeys but rarely transit through on connections.

PIT’s history as a former hub explains its vast proportions: a “Center Core” has more than 100 retailers including a Furla, Brooks Brothers, and Hugo Boss. There are also mini-museums—one from the Carnegie Science Center and one commemorating Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood—and a recently revamped kids’ zone, created in partnership with Carnegie and the Pittsburgh Children’s Museum. And the airport is home to more than 30 restaurants, ranging from fast-food and quick-service classics to, yes, restaurants by celebrity chefs such as Symon.

Until 9/11, the Pittsburgh airport was a popular hangout. “A lot of people remember when this airport was built 25 years ago, being able to come here on a Friday night for dinner,” Cassotis said. “It’s endearing, it’s genuine. People really like it.” But then TSA ratcheted up its standards; non-travelers were no longer welcome.

Locals would still come here for dinner if they could, claims Cassotis. And she has proof: Over the last three years, the airport has run open house nights once a month, each with a thousand attendees. “The shops and restaurants do well,” Cassotis said of the open houses. “Those days are very good for our bottom line.”

PIT’s expansive facilities are also what make this test program viable. In its heyday, in 2001, a prime year for PIT, the airport counted 9.9 million “enplanements,” that is, passengers boarding planes. In 2016, it clocked just 3.9 million—a decline of 61 percent. “An extra 1,000 people here doesn’t make it feel crowded,” said Cassotis.

For the time being, the program only allows non-traveler visits from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., Monday through Friday.

“Our biggest push is the morning rush,” said Bob Kerlik, vice president of media relations for Pittsburgh International Airport, “so by limiting the hours until after 9, that ensures that we’re not adding to the security line. The last thing we want to do is make security lines longer.”

He says the airport will monitor the length of security queues, and only issue myPITpasses if the lines are moving along quickly. If congestion forms, it’ll halt the distribution of myPITpasses to prioritize ticketed travelers.

At the moment, the program is not part of a larger, national program, said TSA spokesperson Michael England, although it’s not hard to imagine other airports lobbying for a similar program if PIT’s pilot turns out to be a success. “This is an agreement between the airport and local TSA officials,” he said. “For the time being, there are no plans to offer this at other airports.”

The TSA will not be hiring additional personnel to accommodate the program, nor does it anticipate that there will be an impact on checkpoint times. “The public will be strictly vetted and screened as if they were boarding a plane,” England continued. “All rules for carry-on luggage will also apply to those receiving the myPITpass.”

It remains to be seen if airports with out-the-door security lines, like New York City’s JFK and Chicago O’Hare would welcome the prospect of increasing volume by any amount. And in cities like those, where restaurant and shopping options are plentiful, it remains to be seen if locals would welcome the prospect of visiting an airport for fun. But not Pittsburgh.

“This airport is the pride of the community,” said Cassotis. “Why not let people pass through and enjoy it?”

©2017 Bloomberg L.P.

This article was written by Nikki Ekstein from Bloomberg and was legally licensed through the NewsCred publisher network. Please direct all licensing questions to legal@newscred.com.