Category: Travel

The Gates (Central Park) VR Scenes

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Elizabeth Gentile has posted some lovely VR scenes from Central Park, site of Christo & Jean-Claude’s The Gates. Scene 1, 2, 3, 4. Well worth checking out.
Kate adds:

In Central Park, there is a great work of art, called The Gates. There are many gates that have beautiful flags hanging from them. They are made by Christo & Jean-Claude. The works of art will be on display for two weeks.

Changing Planes at O’Hare: God Smiles on Me!

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I’ve now experienced this sort of a very pleasant, unexpected airline experience twice…. in 15 years. Changing planes recently at O’hare, I literally jogged from one end of Terminal B to the far end of terminal F in 9 minutes, trying to catch an early flight to Madison. I arrived at the gate with 6 minutes to spare.

The gate attendant waved me through and I walked outside, toward the 50 seat jet. A member of the ground crew then told me that because the Canadair jet’s doors had just closed, I had to return to the terminal. During this discussion, the Air Wisconsin (United Express) Pilot sent another ground crew member toward me to walk me to the plane. They opened the aircraft and I walked on board…..

Flying through O’Hare several times the past few months, I noticed that flights are far more reliable and predictable than one year ago. I emailed Kevin LaWare, Air Wisconsin’s Vice President of Operations to thank him for this vast improvement in service.

LaWare is in a tough spot, working with a bankrupt major carrier (United Airlines). United is evidently shopping their regional services again (squeezing prices) – putting some more pressure on Appleton based regional carrier Air Wisconsin.

I’m impressed with their service and hope they continue to improve.

UPDATE: The Boyd Group takes apart a recent Wharton Study on the airline industry’s problems.

(more…)

Air Travel: Getting worse or?

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Tuesday’s launch of the up to 800 seat Airbus A380 is a useful time to consider the state of air travel:

  • Milwaukee based Midwest Airlines has substantially reduced it’s award winning business class service. I imagine the wide seats will be gone completely in the near future. Tom Daykin takes a look at Midwest and wonders which direction they will go. I frankly think they should take another look at slightly up market service. The race to the bottom is never a successful strategy.
  • The use of regional jets (50 to 100 seats) continues to grow. In effect, we passengers are packed in tighter than sardines on these small jets. Some airlines fly these things on 1000+ mile routes. Not a great way to travel.
  • The emerging microjet or air taxi business offers an interesting glimpse into the future. 4 passenger jets….