HSV is #1! (airport, design, money)

[writerwife]

None of them are worth the trip to Atlanta for me. Nashville is about 1 hr 15 mins and worth it for savings. Atlanta is too far from me since I'm about an hour west of Hsv. But I have to be saving about a hundred bucks or more to go to Nashville.

[bigstick]

If you want to go non stop international,, ATL is far better than BNA. BHM is not even on the radar.

[raj kapoor]

I always get the best rates and never wait an unreasonable time. Domestically I connect in Dallas as I am mostly going west and if Europe, I always connect through NY. A true international airport as opposed to an international hub.

I don't like hubs, their purposes and how they treat people or how they expect people to feel fortunate to have access to the hub. What a joke all that is. I know people who fly east to go west all the time because of a nearby hub. I suppose that it has become a dumbing down process. It just does not seem to occur to them to find the most direct route at the best time and price.
Since I do it all the time I know it can be done. So why are all those people sitting in places like Atlanta for hours.

Not me,
raj

[bigstick]

Originally Posted by raj kapoor

I always get the best rates and never wait an unreasonable time. Domestically I connect in Dallas as I am mostly going west and if Europe, I always connect through NY. A true international airport as opposed to an international hub.

I don't like hubs, their purposes and how they treat people or how they expect people to feel fortunate to have access to the hub. What a joke all that is. I know people who fly east to go west all the time because of a nearby hub. I suppose that it has become a dumbing down process. It just does not seem to occur to them to find the most direct route at the best time and price.
Since I do it all the time I know it can be done. So why are all those people sitting in places like Atlanta for hours.
Not me,
raj

Raj,

It is clear you don't give ATL props...But ATL is not an international hub, c'mon man.ATL just recently opened a massive all International terminal...http://www.atlanta-airport.com/internationalterminal/

[Wandering_Missourian]

ATL has been the busiest passenger airport in the world since 1998. You can fly to over 50 countries directly from ATL. It may not have the customer service that you'd like to see (what U.S. airport does when compared to places like Singapore - Changi?), but downplaying its importance globally is silly. If ATL were shut down for a week, the entire global passenger and cargo distribution system would be thrown into chaos.

[LCTMadison]

Every time I've flown international (Europe) I have gone direct out of ATL. I've never had to connect in NY.

We lived in Europe for 4 years, and I honestly can't count how many times I flew back and forth, always directly into and directly out of ATL....except one time flying home, I flew into Detroit.....that is a horrible airport.

[RatSnake]

We are a family with young kids - with prescription medicines, syringes etc.

The TSA screening process is 100% better here than any airport I've been to.
- The TSA folks here are just on a whole different level
- The lines here ... what lines?

Unless - I have family in ATL or another appointment I need to go to in Nashville, for just $20 /ticket, I'll suck it up.

[Maya Blue]

Originally Posted by RatSnake

We are a family with young kids - with prescription medicines, syringes etc.

The TSA screening process is 100% better here than any airport I've been to.
- The TSA folks here are just on a whole different level
- The lines here ... what lines?

Unless - I have family in ATL or another appointment I need to go to in Nashville, for just $20 /ticket, I'll suck it up.

I agree. A thousand times more cordial than anywhere else.

[FatTails]

I hate going through TSA with a baby. Sometimes you get really nice agents who practically apologize for having to test your milk. On the other hand... I once went through TSA and almost had my ice packs (for the milk) confiscated because they had started to melt and weren't 100% solid.

[SarahBellum]

I travel quite a bit and I do love to fly out of HSV. It's less than 10 minutes from my house to the airport and when coming home from a long trip, that short ride home is great. TSA is really cordial here and, compared to most airports, there are never real lines.

However, I do have to take some things into consideration. I go to Europe fairly often and when the fare difference is $400 or so, I start to waffle. The last time I did fly from HSV to Europe (the fare was only $300 more than out of ATL) I had a change in Chicago with a 4 hour layover. Before the day was out, it was a 13 hour layover with more gate changes than you'd believe. A friend on the same trip opted to drive to Atlanta and she was in London in 8 hours via a nonstop flight. On the way home, my Chicago to HSV flight was delayed repeatedly and finally cancelled at near midnight. They put me on a 6am flight the next day so I opted to stay in the airport. The next morning, that flight was delayed until after lunch. Since that little adventure, when I book a trip I take into consideration the chance of extended delays when changing planes. Atlanta does offer nonstops to lots of European cities!

I've also found so really good fares out of Chattanooga from time to time. I have friends there so I can usually go a day early, visit, and park the car for free.