Originally Posted by
Kacee
US citizens are also dumped landside. The only major difference in treatment is the line at immigration may be longer for visitors. Just as it is for us when we travel to most other countries. Some of the longest immigration lines I've ever seen have been for visitors to Canada, Japan, Mexico, or the UK.
Don't forget Beijing and Lagos, both of which can stretch 1+ hours
Originally Posted by
Kumar2013
I don't mean to sound gloomy but a 20 minute walk is not to be taken lightly - lots of older people would find this a challenge and might prefer shuffling slowly through security over walking that far. Even for others, it's a challenge with a 15 lb backpack - as an example I had to move twice between Terminals B and C at LAX and the walk was tiresome.
Cry me a river. Have you ever walked from a UA gate in the Queen's terminal (LHR 2) to immigration, then connected to a BA flight in T5 or worse yet to the HEX train? What about landing at a bus gate at FRA and then walking miles to a train hop, to security, and then another walk to gates? Or from IAH B/C gates to the E terminal gates? And don't get me started on my recent journey that seemed to traverse most of IST from the end of one pier, across the main concourse to the lounge and then back to another pier.
All of these were 20 minutes or more, and probably 5-10x longer than anything I have even encountered at SFO. Our home airport is well designed, easy to navigate and quite compact compared to other world class airports. I will stack it up against almost anywhere.