MaxFlying

YYZ-CUN-YYZ (in among the other adventures).

YYZ called Zone 1 and 2 together.

CUN. What can I say? Huge mess at the gate. Two guys spend ages arranging poles and tapes with no obvious purpose. Someone appears with the Zone sign (Zone 1/2 on one side, 3/5 on the other). Finally walks out and puts in the post to much anticipation. Pointing completely down the middle of two potential lines. So no-one knows which side to go. My wife dared to turn it a little to clarify. The GA comes back out and moves everyone back demanding to know who turned the sign (which remained not facing to any line). Just awful. I think zone 6 may have been "those without a BP for this flight please board now!"

yyznomad

MaxFlying

He was much younger and cooler than me. I think my wife was pretty close to going with him and giving me up to CBSA. Someone in J for the first time is also always cute, like a lost puppy!

Plumber

Anyone been through Montego Bay lately?

They still dont have 'Zone' signs- only 'Priority' and 'Economy' signs for boarding...that resulted yesterday in the queue being about 60M metres long with what looked to be 100+ people in it..We were boarding n Mainline A330.. Business Cabin has 27 seats and I was told there is only one other SE on the flight. Yet they still claimed that they are boarding by Zone number, but didn't actually call any zones over the AP system.

I stood by the side and waited till other Zone 1 people boarded, but when a bunch of Zone 2s started boarding, I interrupted the Gate Agent. So, apologies to any Zone 1 people that I may have cut in front of when I complained to the Gate Agent (the ones that may have been behind the Zone 2s in the queue)

And note to AC- please send some 'Zone' singes down to MBJ!!

djjaguar64

ZONED boarding is a mess and its not working, it creates chaos that's it, for passengers and staff manning the gates.

quantumofforce

not in Tokyo, they know how to organise it. Maybe AC should send staff to Tokyo so they can see how the outsourced staff do a better job than AC staff even!

yyznomad

Fiordland

We are talking about the Japanese. They have tape on the floor on subway platforms telling you where to stand while people get off incoming trains. The Japanese seek order from chaos. Canadians do not behave this way.

It works in Tokyo because Canadians conform to pier pressure. There is a critical mass of Japanese following the system that the Canadian fall in line and go with the flow.

yyznomad

canadiancow

Ignoring the Japanese aspect, the boarding areas I've seen for AC in Asia (note: that's not many) tend to have lots of room.

YVR at gates with 5 separate lanes and tons of space also seems to board fairly well.

YYZ international, even with multiple lanes, but no space for queueing, does not work as well.

Until you can actually have separate 1/2 lanes with ample space to line up, I don't think anything else is going to work. How do you "enforce" it when you have a line of 122222121222122122212212122122221222221 behind a sign that says "1/2" ? It's not like they can say "you need to line up where you're supposed to".

"Don't line up in the lane marked with your zone" is stupid.

"Current Zone" and "Bypass" is something that I believe exists (possibly as a trial) on one of the US airlines. It's an interesting concept. It would technically extend "board at your leisure" to zones 3 and 4, but it's not a horrible idea. Especially if the signs are electronic and can change.

jc94

AC electronic zone signs controlled by AC GAs.

What could go wrong.

RangerNS

The UA gates in Boston that just don't open if you are being a dick are also great.

yyznomad

Sure, they have extra space, but let me tell you if NRT or HND were afforded the little space that elsewhere like YYZ has, you would still end up with Japanese-standard service and orderliness.

quantumofforce

interesting that such a dense urban area like Tokyo can afford the room, but YYZ cannot.

yyznomad