NW does do it and somewhat more effectively in my opinion.

Now that my DL status is recognized on NW, I'm finally paying attention to the priority boarding line and it seems that they have it wedged between the general boarding line and the scanner at each of the airports I've used it at so far. So you walk up and shoehorn your way between GB and the scanner and zip right in.

For whatever reason I've had a hell of a time getting to the gate on time when flying NW (I guess cause I'm used to a five minute delay with DL?) so I've consistently arrived late and thus had to use the priority line.

This is one of the few aspects of NW I prefer (along with the surprisingly scrumptious omelette and sausage breakfast).

As a continental flyer who recently just attained silver elite, I can say that it is great to be able to board at your leisure. I can go get some food, take my time, and when I am ready to board, just walk up to the elite line, wait about 5 seconds before the GA takes my boarding pass, and walk straight onto the plane. No fuss.

In fact it works quite flawlessly. I was thinking about switching to DL, but perhaps not anymore? If continental can make it work, why can't Delta?

You are not saying our Breezeway concerms being discussed have you reconsidering DL? As much as we gripe about this the majority of us are happy with the airline.

Well, to be honest, yes. As a silver on continental upgrades are pretty rare, so the few benefits that I do receive--other than the upgrades--I really cherish!

Not to hijack the thread, but do you think that DL has anything else to offer me? I mean Delta seems like a great airline, probably my favourite after Continental, but is there honestly much reason to switch? Especially since i am living in SFO....Continental's partnership with United will really help me out a lot....

Back to the "breezeway", they can make it work, and if they do, it will give me another incentive to switch sometime in the future...or at least fly them when continental doesn't work for me

this is the worst thing that was every invented..it sucks

CO has it set up (as I've experienced it) with the pass reader in the middle of the two lines - regular on one side - blue carpet on the other. This seems to work much more intuitively for everyone than either DL or NW.

And despite what the earlier post said, NW has also been pretty inconsistent in their presentation of the red carpet. Sometimes it is set up and used well. Other times the red carpet is up against a wall somewhere.

Exactly, because of BW? Gimme a break.

They should board Zones 1-3 through the Breezeway. Works very well on CO. That way, there is no confusion as to when the Breezeway opens, and Elites aren't jumbled up in two lines.

Bingo. That's exactly why it works. If DL did this the system would be flawless.

Merger Postive: Breezeway
 

One thing DL seems to have fixed from the NW side of things is priority boarding. Over the past 5 months or so, I've pretty much always boarded after F/Elite boarding, and every time have been able to walk straight up to the GA on the Breezeway side of the boarding lane, present boarding pass, and proceed. My success with the Red Carpet was not nearly as good.

So +1 for DL there.

I agree. The problem with NW was their boarding system - F, elites, then "all aboard." So those non-elites in Y who wanted to be assured of overhead space for their carry ons crowded the boarding area. Heck, if I were a non-elite, I would do exactly the same thing.

But with DL's boarding process by zones, no need to crowd the gate area.

FYI I flew AA last week and was surprised on one of the four flights that they did the "all aboard" boarding call after F and elites. That is not normal for AA, at least from my experience. Boarding by rows or zones is much more civilized and avoids the gate crowding that existed with NW's process.

It took DL some time to figure out how to implement Breezeway. DL also recently changed to the 4 zone boarding system (it used to be up to 9 zones). It does seem to work better now.

Gotta +1 this one pretty readily. Boarding is great on both metals lately - breezeway basically works as expected and I never have to wait very long to board. Especially now that I have a sky club membership, if I have a confirmed F seat I often show up a few minutes into the boarding process (hey, the club has Alaskan Amber :)) and can really easily jump line and get to my seat without any hassle.

I never had really thought about it until I flew on an AS codeshare, where they seemed to board by "back half of coach" followed by "front half of coach". This caused a mad rush to board with lots of crowding, while with DL zones the crowd would have been much thinner.

Breezeway/boarding definitely did end up with best of class, for once. ^

I have to agree EXCEPT: LAX on the NRT flight out of gate 68. Man, there is another gate (CO) right next to 68 and not only can you not see the Breezeway you can't tell where the line starts for each flight as they depart within 15 mins of each other. It is a mess and they have to do something about it. I also found NRT to be a mess and it has always been great (the signs...follow the signs). I am not sure what happened at these 2 stations but they went from being the most organized NW boarding gates to the worst.

Have to agree that it does work fairly well. Had one very weird flight out of Cincinnati recently where they boarded First Class and then started boarding by zones and NO ONE was boarding. Finally called for ALL ABOARD about five minutes after First Class boarded. As I boarded, the flight was nearly empty (I am a GM)-- I was late because of a bathroom stop. However, eventually the flight boarded completly full. The FA stated that she had never had an experiece like that. (My friend who was traveling with me reported that was because that HUGE line at the McDonald's had all our passengers in it.)