How to fuck up an airport
radiospaetkauf.com
radiospaetkauf.com
First: post-security you will find some of the most disgusting food ever served in an airport, but hey it’s also expensive and the servers don’t hide how much they hate being there! However, there is a little shop near the left-side stairs that sells better alcohol as well as soft drinks, and various food including (last I checked) pretty decent sandwiches. Just get provisions there and have a seat near your gate.
Second: when the security lines are moving too slowly it’s often worth trying the faraway one, which is actually outside the main hall. It’s so insanely counterintuitive, it’s the last one to get backed up.
Third: on arrival you may want a train, and it’s not at all obvious what one goes where nor even which ticket you need. You can use a standard subway ticket with any train departing from the airport, and you can buy that ticket in advance with the BVG app. Oh, and the S-Bahn is probably not the train you want if you’re reading this comment. Just go to Hauptbahnhof and reorient from there, IMO.
Guten Flug!
I'm pretty sure any train from BER airport would be covered under the 9-euro ticket. The trains not covered under the ticket are primarily ICE (inter-city high speed) and anything operated by another company (e.g. FlixTrain).
almost. the airport is one stop into zone C, and a “standard” ticket would only be valid in zones A and B.
you need either an ABC ticket or a standard ticket + extension ticket.
It was amazing. I also never realized how much I appreciate everything in that airport being connected by corridors until I had to navigate CDG and it’s stupid trains and buses.
To be fair, those ridiculous delays had little to do with the layout of the airport, and everything with how it’s managed.
The security staff was seriously underpaid and they got fed up with it. During COVID a lot of them switched to better paying careers. It will take months for new staff to be hired and trained unfortunately.
Unless you're absolutely rich, you probably shouldn't default to using a cab in a city known for it's amazing public transport.
If you have the budget to eat at the airport, drink cocktails and pay for early boarding, then you're most likely loaded.
If you're not rich, but still pay for convenience services like that, I'd say you have irrational spending behavior.
wow
Then I must be mega-rich.
'not spare' would be: "50€ ? I could buy xy for that!"
Especially since airport <-> city is almost always a separate system as well than intra-city transport.
And I've missed the last RE to HbF a few times (EasyJet being late often) but the last S-Bahn runs surprisingly late. Same in the morning, you can take the very first U-Bahn at the dawn of the day among drunk people going home, and do the last bit by bus. I never needed a taxi.
When I lived there, TXL was still operating, and showing up 3 minutes before the gate opened was an also interesting experience. But I understand people in the neighborhood being fed up it closed down 10 years late.
This also describes all 3 major NYC airports. I have to plan around it and bring food with me.
The signs tiny and all in the same red/white color. The monitors tiny and sparse.
The placement of the tickets for the trains placed where you do not pass. And just good luck if you go down the wrong stairway and then reached the nowhere, without any visible signs.
They cared about the CI way more than about fast passenger throughput.
Continuous integration?
Sometimes, past performance is not indicative of the future.
Spoilers: he designed BER for fast passenger transit, just like Tegel, but the airport authorities wanted more shopping space. So they crammed as many shops as they could in detriment of the passenger experience. And then there's the situation with the rise of low-cost airlines who weren't allowed to use the jetway...
I definitely recommend listening to the whole series. It's really well done and a must-listen for anyone with interest in project management.
The first issue that caused the issues, the fire system, was designed to suck air underground, because the architect did not want a fire system to obstruct his roof, never mind that smoke and hot air naturally rise. https://www.thegermanreview.de/p/the-real-story-behind-berli...
If you hire a design team to create a car with a massive hole where the engine and wheels should be, because it is more "clean", and then neglect to hire an engineer to check their work is feasible, is it on the design team or on you being incompetent?
You can say all you want "hot air naturally rises", true, but I doubt an architect has the training to be a safety engineer, and before you say "oh well that's obvious", consider that heavy objects naturally fall to the earth, and yet we have airplanes.
They had a design which would work, but nobody in charge actually did the legwork of bothering to check if it was feasible or not, and/or bungled it so badly even if it were feasible it was like attaching a helicopter to an airplane and then wondering why it didn't fly...
With Lufthansa, I'd assume that FRA is super busy and didn't actually have a gate available at the time; a 747 is a really large aircraft to load using buses.
The last thing I want to do after a long and tiring flight is load up into a bunch of packed buses.
If you choose a normal airline and fly to any reasonably big airport that's not overcrowded, you'll get a jetway outside exceptional situations.
thisisfine.jpg
A lot of airports are vast complexes and takes you a while to get from A - B, Tegel was quite quaint in comparison!
Admittedly for a major/global city - it was too small.
I flew through Tegel a dosen times and it was a horrible experience each time. Not sure which was worse - the old terminal, or the new barrack added on to the first one.
Also, I've seen multiple airports that allowed you to be 20 min before boarding and still get through. On Warsaw Chopin, which is 2x bigger than Tagel, I can arrive 10 min before boarding and still make it on time. With most airports the size of Tagel as well.
Having said all that - the architecture was nice indeed, and I'm sure it was very functional when it was built and there was 4x less traffic, planes were 30% smaller and the security was way lighter.
Schonefeld was better, though getting there involved taking Ryanair…
(Honestly, I expect Tegel was pretty good for Schengen traffic).
Fast in and out, even with the X10 bus connection.
The main terminal was weirdly narrow on airside, but from memory apart from having to stand to drink beer was just fine.
I liked the currywurst carriage outside by departures if I was ever more than 30 minutes early for my flight.
Schönefeld on the other hand … grr. I argue that that airport was exceptionally poor in a way I’ve never experienced outside of corporate airports used for industrial and mining facilities.
This is true many places, although I tend to show with a tighter timetable myself.
But it's so absurd, so silly. It's actually faster to drive from Ottawa to Toronto(4 to 5 hr drive) than take a plane, and cheaper.. even with current fuel costs, too.
What a way to ruin a mode of travel.
In all seriousness though, any country serious about climate change should ban short-haul flights.
And certainly far, far slower than a plane could be, with no hours of pre-flight waiting.
More comfortable than a plane, with its cramped seating, for sure.
Really, a prop plane is not horrible for the environment, especially compared to cars.
A propeller plane shines here. If boarding is quick, and there is no customs as it is in country, and you just carry on? You save time, and it's better than 20 to 50 people driving independantly.
A plane can also fly straight too, so it can take even 1/3 of the time to get there.
Which is why boarding slow downs are so sad.
The train brings you in the middle of both city center, directly integrated with transit, you can show up about 10 min before your departure, etc. It’s just the actual rail that is the problem.
I flew through the new Berlin airport 2 times this week, and had no issues going through security and to the gates. That 3-4hrs in your case seems absurdly long - were there crazy lines at the checkin or sth?
Tegel OTOH was super quick albeit poorly connected to the rest of Berlin.
I flew ~1,000 times, and saw ~300 airports. I could write tens of books on how to make airports better... But the problem is that the incentives are such that this is not the way to go. Airports want to make money by selling you stuff. Period. They don't care about giving you a great experience.
They're not even cheaper than normal shops - more expensive than Amazon. What's the point?
This then makes you more likely to later buy an Armani t-shirt for $80.
The store in the airport is there to make you think the brand is glamorous, to convince you of its mystique, not to sell things.
Say you arrive by taxi, you would go down the street in the middle, drop off at one of the four check-in areas (the triangular structures), then make your way through check-in and security and you're almost at your plane. The train station is below this structure and in the centre.
This opened in 1992 - Terminal 2, built later, uses a different approach with more shopping etc. along the way =)
Any follow-up to that will always end up being "fucked up".
That stopped there though, did you ever fly from B or C? Tolerable enough if you're catching a commuter to Munich or something at 7am, but once it's filled with tourists it was appalling, far too small, far too crowded.
Living in the west of the city, I'm quite happy having the airport moved further away for noise reasons though :}
I mostly flew from C (cheap EU flights), sometimes from A and D (Asia, UK). I don't recall ever flying from B.
I agree that A gates was a sweet spot but even C was great. The airport optimised for getting you out of there ASAP, both for departures and arrivals.
I usually managed to get from the plane to my living room within 30 minutes (just with a carry-on, naturally).
BER was also a shitshow but the old airports badly needed replacement. I’ve flown through BER 3 times so far and all of them went fine and much more convenient than the old ones (with the exception of inner EU trips which I anyway prefer to do via train instead when possible).
You can’t possibly mean Tegel? I’ve never met anyone who has used Tegel who didn’t think it was clearly the worst airport in the world.
I used to literally avoid doing any business in Berlin because Tegel was so painful.
Tegel was always the quick and convenient one.
Food options seem to have gone downhill now that the ok airside restaurant only does burgers. I’ve had delightful meals there in the past, making delays more than bearable.
I always preferred going to TXL from ARN, felt like I was getting a flying bus to my destination, very close to the center so it was a matter of disembarking and getting to the center in 30 minutes or less. Flying to Schönefeld had the same atrocious facilities and another hour of a train ride to the city...
It's true that Tegel was conveniently located and that boarding could be quite fast in terminal A. But if your flight got delayed after you were through security you would be stuck in a crammed space and your only opportunities for food would be overpriced Pretzels. And the whole thing was just outrageously ugly.
I've frequently used TXL and it was actually my favorite. However, I can see why at least some people hated it. While A-gates boardings were very fast (for which reason, I personally used to find it very convenient), they were also very crammed, which surely bothered a lot of people.
The experience of A<>C was very different. I didn't have a particular bad memory of C, but it didn't have services, which can be annoying when there's lots to wait.
It was also convenient for a two-legs connection (since one typically had to take a metro, then the bus), since the second leg (bus) was short. But again, some people may frown upon anything that is not directly connected like Heathrow.
Well, you've met one (or actually, many) now. So you won't be able to use that line moving forward.
I don't believe you. No business owner is their right mind would believe that you avoided doing business anywhere based on airport opinions.
Like a traveling salesman maybe.
You mean which Berlin's airport? As Berlin-native for few years I used the Schönefeld numerous times... and the staff there was some mixture of rude primitive sadists. Behaving towards passengers as if they're taking revenge for something. I just want to fly out of here, you cunt.
And I thought I had picked up the wrong person to check my papers that one time when we flew out from Schönefeld.
Schönefeld is not in Berlin.
Too many too important entities invested in real estate on the Tempelhof's approach routes to keep it operating. Now the very area of Tempelhof is pure goldmine. Tegel is next.
> Schönefeld is not in Berlin.
Neither BER is in Berlin.
They've been saying that for a very, very long time
Actually the newer (low-cost) terminals worked better than the original one. No frills and less crowded.
The main terminal had an interesting design but it was slightly better than SXF (the one that had communist efficiency - take it as you will)
On the bright side, as long as the BER could not open, the international aviation show ILA was absolutely amazing, because they were able to use the infrastructure without having to care for ongoing air traffic.
As good as German engineering is, the airport infra is equally worse.
It’s a shame. I like flying lufthansa. They have the shortest flight times to Asia from the west coast.
Can you elaborate on this? Where do you mean by "west coast"?
Every other airline takes at least a couple of hours more. Some take 4+ hours longer.
And indeed, a quick flight search shows that Qatar's total flight times from Seattle to major Indian airports are all at least 2 hours shorter than Lufthansa's.
Note: This is not actual advice. Not responsible for any resulting fines or prison sentences.
1. Buy tickets to a bunch of flights on any day.
2. Check-in luggage with a raspberry pi inside with a bunch of electronics coming out of it and two powered 8 segment displays.
3. Do not board any of those planes.
All those planes will be delayed while they remove your checked luggage from the hold since nowadays planes don't take-off with luggage if the traveller doesn't also board. With all planes delayed you can probably choke the runways and delay all departures.
(edit: This made sense before someone uncensored the title)
Couple of anecdotes - the baggage handling design (I saw the revised version) was shuttling suitcases easily above 25 miles/hour and the architects had them drop through chutes at such high speeds
Much later, with the youtube era, I came across the various conspiracies on DIA. Good for a bored late night browsing
I read an analysis of the baggage system about a year after DIA opened, and it was fascinating as a young engineer. Essentially, the original system could never work. Airlines schedule in clusters - they try to make groups of flights arrive in groups and depart in groups, this allows them to create connecting flights. But the DIA system couldn't handle spiky traffic loads, even though this is how airlines design their schedules.
The ridiculous roof had leaks for years.
The current round of modifications and renovations (on a 25 year old airport, they want to renovate?) have been going on more than 2 years, gone over budget, they've already fired the lead contractor once, from what I can tell they're a long way from completion. When I read that part of Berlin's issue was that they wanted more retail, I think this is why they're renovating, they're not trying to create a better traveling experience, they're trying to create a better shopping experience.
They added a Westin onto the end of the terminal, the rates to stay there are absolutely insane. For the life of me, I can't understand why you'd stay out at the airport, when you're a train ride away from downtown.
I'm sure that DIA is the result of a bunch of corruption (Denver is underrated for the corruption here), and I feel like the conspiracy theories are some weird outgrowth of the corruption in the city government here, like some bacteria bloom that pops up around a sewage plume.
I was just there on Friday and it was amazing how unfinished things are. Panels missing, no seating near some gates.
It’s a very nice mall that happens to have airplane gates.
Really though, the airport’s homepage sells it the best.
https://berlin-airport-brandenburg.com/
> Shopping Therapy at Berlin Airport Both Terminals 1 and 5 (Terminal 2 is not operational yet) offer a “shopping heaven”, large shopping areas where you can find whatever you may look for. Last-minute presents, famous brands, local stores, BER airport has all the answers depending on your desires! Are you travelling on a budget and want to avoid unnecessary expenses? Take a walk and go for window shopping. Still a pleasing and relaxing experience!
Have you been there? It’s a bit of a weird ghost-town. Definitely not quite in ‘full service.’
Hans hovering near a kitchen on a new cook's first day.
"Du verbrennst das Schnitzel! <utters fire alarm noises>"
* All the public bids where too expensive. so the City decided to be it's own contractor, it must be cheaper.
* Keep changing plans, double the size .. after starting construction.
* Hire an architect that hates shops, change all plans again to add shops.
* Start paying contractors by time instead of by job, they start stealing.
* because of all the changes : stairs don't fit, cable management is broken, firesafety doesn't work.
* Don't fuck with german firesafety, they won't approve it, and you can't bribe them.
16 years later: opening with a capacity that is far below what's needed.
The opposite end of the spectrum is CAHSR, which hired thousands of consultants with a staff of 180 and with very little to show for it https://www.latimes.com/local/california/la-me-california-hi...
The problem was that actually following the advice to keep minimal in-house staff who could check the work was really stupid, no matter who would win such tenders.
Haven't been to BER myself.
There are some well designed airports in Asia (multiple countries).
In USA, I personally felt SEA (Seattle-Tacoma) and DFW (Dallas/Fort-Worth) were rather good.
LAX is a mess for domestic/international transfers, with remote terminals and having to go though multiple buses right through the middle of planes on tarmac. However, I've gone through LAX many times that I now know my way around.
LAX was also the airport where I physically spotted the plane I had to board, and then figured out how to reach there by going in the general direction (because if you started your journey at a smaller airport and is changing planes at LAX, the original boaring pass you received may not have the gate written on it).
1. Spoof GPS, as in emulate the constellation. Randomize it every few minutes. Move transmitter around.
2. Plain old jam GPS. You can buy cheap and nasty GPS jammers. If you're good with electronics, hook em up to a 555 timer and trigger to prevent a lock but like 5% duty cycle.
3. Spoof ADS-B to create thousands or 10's of thousands of planes in airspace. Most systems will die from not enough ram to handle these. If they do survive, then they'll get alerts from everything everywhere.
4. Jam ADS-B. Not as terrible, but still bad.
5. Build a Gnuradio flow that watches 117.975-137 MHz and selectively emits white noise on channels when in use. Kills comms.
I really don't get it why Berlin and Moscow don't get along very well, it's essentially the same. But Moscow is less dirty.
Around 2005, the newer Shanghai airport had information boards that didn't contain information except various permutations of Windows' BSODs. IIRC, it was that terrible, inefficient design of long and narrow.
In general, DFW is a better layout: almost circles of gates globbed almost contiguous to each other as lettered terminals relatively close together connected by a bidirectional tram, many security screening entrances and exits, and people moving devices (i.e., moving walkways, "golf carts", etc.)
Yet still the UK holiday companies are endlessly pimping last minute summer deals with the knowledge that flights through July and August are going to be totally messed up.
People now have to wait for hours, hundreds of flights are cancelled daily and they still refuse to pay a reasonable wage. Of course the CEO blames everything on others and allots himself a big bonus as usual.
And society bailed out these guys in a big way during Corona... Next time we should just let them fall.
Compare this to busses and trains who got furlough PLUS a very generous package to cover nearly all of their running costs.
The furlough scheme allowed companies to keep employees without having to pay them (they were paid by government). If airlines and airports were so short-sighted to still layoff plenty of staff then they should now be made to bear the full cost.
There really wasn't an option for many airlines and airports to continue furloughing everyone, they simply didn't have the cash to do so.
Ryanair did have the cash and they didn't lay anyone off to my knowledge - and hence are having way better performance than nearly anyone else in Europe (they also have their own airport ground crews at many airports).
How executives get away with these decisions... and it's Europe wide situation if not worldwide. Of course from the perspective of executives the COVID era was a success because they fetched government bailouts, then diluted the companies' shares. Great success! bonuses followed.
The parent mentioned that it prevents him from sharing, not that they were personally worried about it. I'm also perfectly comfortable using salty language with friends and family, but very rarely use it on social channels. It's all about context.
The world is falling apart and people are worried about Nim compiler version 2.0. Talk about misplaced concerns.
The world is falling apart and people are worried about who wins champions league this year. Talk about misplaced concerns.
Where exactly is the line for you? What if this article began with a picture of a guy with his dick out fucking a pig that had a picture of an airport drawn on it. Would that still be acceptable? Because if its not then I have to say. The world is falling apart...
My terminal looked and felt like a prefab chicken coop.
Your comment, though, falls in the category of what this site guideline asks people not to post:
"Please don't complain about tangential annoyances—things like article or website formats, name collisions, or back-button breakage. They're too common to be interesting." - https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
The point isn't that these things aren't annoying, it's that changing the topic of the thread to one of these annoyances is a big step down in discussion quality, so we should all try to resist.
Are you sure?
These things are cyclical. For example, I would say we are way more prudish and puritan than we were in the 90s.
There was a bit of a movement in TikTok to get freaky stuff out of Pride Parades, for example, because the younger generation of LGBT has portions that are more prudish.
One or two stars, it's an interesting phenomenon. There are cases where you might need to censor a 'fuck' because you are citing someone (or a work named thus) in a medium that doesn't allow it, but most of it seems to be self-censorship.
When our German dot com success company was acquired by a us "enterprise", we got a few 'mericans over. After his first team meeting this young US citizen is dead embarrassed: "they are using the eff word! In meetings! All the time!" To which we suggested: welcome to Germany...
I never got around this language purity cult. You can lie whatever you like, and incite hate and what have you, but "beware your choice of words".
I eventually found it on Spotify by searching for Berlin airport.
To save others from Spotify's search: https://open.spotify.com/show/1dcDdTZgwicbxkb7OgNLo2?si=tGB6...
Or things on itunes in general?
I used https://getrssfeed.com/, though /feed is a standard path for RSS.