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Comment by r00fus | Hacker News Reader

I remember that flying in the 90s was a hell of a lot smoother than after 911. I recall once (1998) getting to the airport 10m before departure time, running through the airport (with help from airline agents), and making the departure (a bit sweaty).

This would be impossible today.

I wonder how much of this was move to deregulate vs. increased consolidation in today's market.

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>I remember that flying in the 90s was a hell of a lot smoother than after 911.

When living in Redwood City, from 2000 to 2001 I could leave my apartment, park my car at SFO, get through security, and get to the plane's gate within 50 minutes.

I did 15 minutes from front door to gate once when I lived 7 minutes from the airport.

Even Heathrow T5 it’s only 10 minutes from entering he building to getting to the gate, 15 it you’re in B or C gates. I’ve done 33 minutes from Paddington to a gate for a flight leaving T2 in the past.

The entire process when I flew from Spain on Sunday took 6 minutes from signing the rental car form to sitting next to the gate.

Airports are now giant shopping malls. The incentive is for you to hang out and be a good consumer. Too short, no shopping. Too long, they need more chairs, space and wifi.

Obviously once the door closes they won't reopen it anymore, but at smaller airports with TSA PreCheck it's possible to get there fairly last minute.

Even in 2015, in O'Hare Chicago, there were like 5-6 passengers, including me and family that were late due to a late connection and the flight doors had closed. The bridge was not retracted yet. No one was in the counter either. But we could see the pilots and all of us started yelling and waving at them. They got the door opened and we all got in. That was nice of them. Don't remember if it was United or Delta

Just had that happen to me back in November, Delta at ORD. If they can get you on, they'll get you on.

If it was Terminal 1, it would have been United; Old Terminal 3 would have been Delta. Source: lived in Chicago many years and flew a lot in and out of ORD.

I have gone from airport drop off to gate in less than 10min numerous times at Portland airport (PDX), especially if it’s United which has gates in the E terminal.

I find Baltimore very quick in the US - I prefer to fly to/from BWI back to the U.K. than from IAD. The experience is all about how well staffed and equipped the airport is for the number of passengers.

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