Originally Posted by
KBMIFlyer
I am usually an AA flyer, but I fly Delta on occasion and usually find them to be a fine airline. Usually well run with polite staff.
The exception to this is always Orlando. i know part of this is just dealing with families traveling to Disney, but the Delta setup seems to poor. The terminals are always so crowdedc. When I fly Southwest, American, or even Frontier out of Orlando, it is a much better experience.
Here is just a list from my recent flight yesterday, but my other experiences have been similar.
1. I always have bad luck with TSA pre-check here. I am not sure why, but the lines move at different speeds and I always have a slower employee. I think that is my bad luck.
2. The 70-99 gates only get one train, since international arrivals have the other train. So the trains are less frequent and more crowded. Couple that with the BA and Virgin London afternoon bank and you have a lot of passengers crammed in the trains.
3. The quick food choices are ..to be polite...bad. And a 5:00 on a Friday night, the line to Nathans' hot dogs is blocking the entrance to the 70-70 pier. You know the food choices are bad when Burger King has a long line. i will admit my pizza from MCO MKT was not all that bad.
4. I had to go to three restrooms to find one where the for the MEN was out the door. Pity the poor women who are trying to use the restroom before or after their flights.
5. The worst part is the end of the 70-79 pier. Yesterday they were boarding an LGA 6:20 fight out of gate 78, ATL 6:30 flight out of 76, MSP 6:30 flight out of 72, LAX 6:40 out of 73, and a 6:50 SLC out of 75. It was chaotic, the poor gate agents trying to synchronize their boarding calls, people standing everywhere. I usually try and wait to board when I don't have carry on luggage, but I actually boarded quickly because being on the crowded a321 was actually more preferable to being in this chaos in the terminal.
So, not to be a rant thread, will this change long term? How will the gate's shuffle once the new south terminal is open? Any chance for better food options?
I should add, I did find the check in area and baggage drop very easy and convenient. I also think the Delta employees at Orlando are some of the best I have come across. I think Orlando would be one of the toughest stations to work.
It”s tough flying out of MCO sometimes, especially during the afternoon TATL bank when you were there. I generally try and avoid flying out of MCO in the afternoon as it’s a lot smother in the morning.
I’ll answer some of your observations as an MCO based flyer.
1) TSA Pre-Check is very inconsistent in MCO. Sometimes it’s a breeze with hardly no wait, even during the TATL evening bank, and other times it’s a mess with 10 min waits.
2) The issue with only one train running is only an issue during the afternoon INTL arrivals, both trains are open to all pax in the AM or when there are no INTL arrivals. This new setup that they do use for arrivals in much better than before IMO as they used to need to sweep each train individually and the TSA officers had to manually control the train and it was a huge mess.
3) The food options at Airside 4 are bad and unfortunately they recently did a “renovation” on the concession areas and while we did get the new MCO MKT and a Bahama Breeze, the Nathan’s and Burger King remained, just were “renovated.” If you want better food options and you have some extra time, I recommend taking the train over to the WN airside (gates 100-129) as they have a much better food options.
4) The men’s room in the center of the 70-79 pier almost always has a line, sometimes the one by the Nathan’s is better, but generally expect to wait.
5) This always happens (especially in the afternoon) and is one of my biggest pet peeves about DL at MCO and unfortunately, there’s nothing DL can really do about it. For those of you who don’t have much experience flying out of MCO, I’ll let this picture do justice.
