That bit isn't so bad ^ You get to appreciate how big those engines are on a 777 when you are being lowered in the lounges.

What gets on my tits WRT the lounges are when you board them, you wait for the counter to roll to zero and then pull three feet off the terminal before stopping to allow a near continuous flow of aircraft through

Why did it take 48 minutes? Chances are you should not blame the lounge. The lounge transits from gate to immigration in 5-10 minutes, or so.

The most likely reason for the delay on the international arrival (particularly after 4pm) is that the waiting area in immigration was overflowing. I have been on the ML, and the driver would not open the gate. The wait for the ML, and the transit time of the lounge have nothing to do with the lounges themselves. The problem is the limited service at customs and immigration. I do not know how the ML arrival is scheduled.

Although I have never timed my plane to exit time at LHR, the walk, and the immigration line for example, also seem to be very time consuming.

Like some others, my experiences are quite different from this. On my last international arrival, I got from touch down to taxi in 28 minutes. Admittedly, it helps to understand how the mobile lounges work (where to stand, etc.) and to avoid the tragedy of checked luggage, but I find they can be quite efficient and save a lot of time tramping down endless corridors.

Several posters caused me to think about the old days at IAD -- early 1980s for me.

During that period I was stationed in the UK and frequently went back & forth between London and Washington. This was in the days before the midfield terminals. I remember boarding one of four mobile lounges that went from the main terminal (the only one existing at that time) directly to a Pan Am or TWA 747. They parked at each of the four door on one side of the 747. There ws no rhyme or reason to the lounge you boarded or which door it parked at. Usually, these 747s were jammed full and you had people crawling over each other all at once getting to their seats. I remember it used to take a full hour from the time you left the main terminal until the aircraft was ready to move. The posted departure time was the time you left the terminal in the mobile lounge, not the time the aircraft actually started moving.

Also, back in those days, the only parking lot was the one right outside the main terminal that is now the hourly/valet lot. During the holidays, it would frequently fill up. If you drove all the way out there and the parking lot was full, you were out of luck. Of course, you couldn't use the couple of dozen spaces reserved for Congressman and Senators. As an aside, all of the rental cars were parked under the terminal where the baggage claims are now located. At least that was convenient!

Ah, the good old days...

The Mobile Lounges brings back memories of watching the which ever Airport movie was at IAD. I fly down to IAD 6 - 8 times a year on Continental whose gates are soo perfectly close to a Mobile Lounge Departure Point. I love flying into IAD just for this reason...

-Vincent

The last time I was on one of the mobile lounges to the plane as an Austrian Airline trip. I was in F, and the lounge took us from the RCC to the plane. It was more convinient than going down to the gate and standing in line to get aboard.

As to the parking at IAD, has anyone seen the new Cell Phone Lot? It is almost 1/2 back to Tysons. I still see people parking on the side of the road leading to the terminal tho.

So which airport do you really love in the dc area?

BWI for its' great parking, easy location up bw parkway & mile long tsa lines?

DCA for when the parking lots are full, when you really want to go somewhere(like europe), for the short runways, & the now all night takeoffs over the neighborhood?

Mobile lounge crash

Was the driver looking at their phone.?

no reports yet of the cause

Recent - Inside DC commentary on the matter....

https://x.com/jdawsey1/status/1988646742737449435



In some coverage about this (either the crash or the recent Congressional testimony about eliminating them) there was a note that at some point (either recently or in the past) IAD had said that they needed to keep them b/c there were no feasible alternatives. Uh, what? I know they gotta ship int’ls over to the main terminal for immigration etc, but it wouldn’t be the first time an international airport would have to deal with such a situation of keeping arriving int'l pax "separate" from others until after immigration/customs. No feasible alternatives?

another crash. no injuries this time: https://www.loudounnow.com/news/dull...78a12da43.html

No it wouldn't. But they are correct, for a variety of reasons at IAD, there currently is no feasible alternative that does not involve thousands of millions of dollars.

Dulles was designed specifically with the plane-mates in mind to keep intl arriving pax separated while bringing them to the FIS at the main terminal - the lounges attached directly to the incoming flight on the ramp and take the pax to the FIS. When the midfield concourses were designed and built a midfield FIS was included. But the midfield FIS is relatively small, 1/3 the size of the current FIB in the main terminal - too small to handle the much larger number of international arrivals terminating travel at IAD the airport now handles. At the same time, the new gate structure rendered using the plane-mates impractical - the ramp area is simple too small to accommodate the lounges. Also, today's planes carry many more pax than the planes when the lounges were designed; here are no gates for planes at the FIB. And the main FIB is about 1 mile from the midfield terminal, not terribly inconvenient for folks that getting a connecting flight nor for the many pax that can't or prefer not to walk so far.

The aerotrain was not designed nor built to service international arriving pax needing inspection. Although initially considered, it was quickly determined to be too complex and too costly to have separate tracks/tunnels to the FIB.

The mobile lounges are not always terribly comfortable if one has to stand in a crowded lounge, but they are no different than standing on the train and certainly WAY more convenient than having to walk from arrival gate to the FIB. Plus, they offer the advantage of planespotting from the ramp. True, the interiors are quite dated, but so what for a 10 minute ride? I have never understood why so many folks are so exercised about them....

So, short of massive capital expenditures* to build/rebuild concourses to include federal immigration and customs inspection, how would YOU propose to, feasibly, handle international arrivals?

*Remember such capital expenditures are added to enplanement fees (eg. tickets) and/or to taxpayers in general via federal AIP funds (most of whom will balk at paying for costs at an airport which they will never, or only sparingly, use).

IAD international arrivals are unforgivably slow- it is a true miracle if you get from plane door to airport exit in under 45 minutes, even with global entry and no checked bags.

Part of the problem is that the arrival corridors are quite narrow, so traffic slows to a snail�s pace.

But the primary problem with the mobile lounges is that there are too few. As a result, on arriving there is a lengthy and unpleasant wait as they stuff them full. If they were to send each one off as soon as all seats were occupied and have another one ready to load, the whole process would be much less objectionable.