DLERT

Certainly Sir - you did not catch the hyperbole since no one has yet to have
gone to ZOO the perfect airport with no glitches or imperfections free parking
valet service adequate staffing no lines no fees no TSA all flights
arrive and depart on time no one misses his flight the checked baggage is
waiting for your claiming and a Uber is at the curb awaiting your beck and
call with no texting or distraction.

mnbp

For many years, NWA exercised exclusive control of the MSP G concourse including selection of all concessions, restaurants and even maintenance of the physical plant - roof, electrical, plumbing, moving walkways, etc - they had responsibility for the entire concourse G building (and collected all the concessionaire lease payments and commissions, of course). DL inherited this G arrangement from NWA after the merger.

MAC took over all responsibility for the G concourse from DL as of Jan 1, 2016, when the original NWA agreement expired, I believe.

It certainly wouldn't surprise me that at lease renewal, OTG (the concessionaire for pretty much all the iPad restaurants and other retail in G) might get replaced with something more along the lines of the rest of MSP, which MAC has controlled all along.

Zorak

ISTR the area by DTW A6/A7 has retail encroachment or at least a relatively narrow concourse with crowding issues at boarding time.

MSPeconomist

At least MAC has been trying to select interesting "local" restaurants and bars.

miraclebear2003

Agree with that if you are coming or going at that end.

DCAflyer81

The current Concourse G actually has some interesting and good places for food and drink during a layover. Anyone remember the 'old' G? Long, dark, dank, boring with very little going on. Now, MSP, with G and the Mall has some great spots and much more to offer passengers than (IMO) ATL or even DTW, who's food options have been lacking and maybe are finally improving. In fact, given DL's price hikes on lounge memberships, I think what MSP is doing is the wave of the future.

CarmenOM

I think the local restaurants and bars are a great feature of MSP; I'm glad to see more coming in in the next few months. However, I also hope that the restaurants at the far end of G keep serving Caffe Vita, an excellent Seattle coffee company. Many Seattleites (me included, as a former long-time Seattle resident) consider it the best of that city's coffee companies.

PV_Premier

to be sure, my complaint has nothing to do with the offerings themselves, rather it is focused on the layout and the utilization of several adjacently spaced gates for concurrent departures, thereby exacerbating the problem with the bad layout. indeed, the actual food and vending offerings are arguably superior to the other parts of the airport and to some of the other hubs, but the layout is so bad that it is easy to overlook the good qualities.

to those who have said "damned if you do, damned if you don't" -- I offer PDX as a good model for providing excellent retail offerings along with adequate gate space for comfortable boarding. I spend less time on the D/E side of the airport than the A/B/C side, but IMO the airport is quite well done from both respects.

MSPeconomist

I go to an airport to get onto a plane and fly, not to eat and drink. IMO this essential function of an airport should be Job #1, not providing some "enhanced" retail "experience".

DLERT

When transiting from the G-F concourses to the E-D-C-A-B one could
easily be confused of where one is at - Airport or the Mall of America !
Looks all the same to me - except for the prices on the goods.
When MSP opened circa early 1961 there was one coffee shop - one restaurant -
one bar and vending machines on the two concourses (Red & Blue)
one news stand and gift shop in the middle of the terminal and NO other
distractions.
One could park his car buy a ticket and check-in and be
boarded on his flight in less than 20 minutes !
Oh those were the days !

MSPeconomist

Well, 1961 is before my time, but before 9/11, I could park on level 3 close to the security checkpoint near the FastTrack gates (about G8) and take less than ten minutes from car to aircraft.

pbarnette

This. And it goes double for hub airports. You'd think seasoned, elite travelers would have figured out something that has been obvious for 20+ years, but I guess not.

pbarnette

Why are you comparing today to a 15-year old experience?

flyerCO

That can be a problem in ATL also. Recently flew through there and the JNB flight was right next to a LHR flight, which had a flight to NRT (I believe) on the other side of it. The GA for the LHR flight tried to get the JNB and NRT GAs to announce the city the announcement was for, but to no avail. The JNB GA would announce that was begining pre-boarding, and everyone would go rushing to the gate for LHR. The GA for LHR would then again announce that the pre-announcement was only for JNB, to which the JNB GA would make an announcement and then would continue doing the same thing. Finally the LHR GA announced that unless it contained the words LONDON - HEATHROW in the announcement, that it was not for this flight and to not come up to the gate. The JNB finished and then the NRT (or wherever it was to) started right up. Again not caring that the announcements are heard by passengers for both gates.

It was the biggest cluster ****. Agents should always use the name of the city in the announcement IMO. Having two 777s and a 767 loading at the same time doesn't work otherwise since gate numbers are meaningless to most people.

GUWonder

Cutting back on free seating in the airport departure area increases the amount of purchasing expenditures passengers make at airport.

Airport owners/operators -- and sometimes even the main airline tenant in a terminal -- get a piece of the retail sales revenue pie in some form or another.

Combine this together and it's no surprise that airports increasingly make passengers go through a shopping mall before getting to the gate areas with a lower proportion of free seats vis-a-vis departing passenger counts.