Speaking for myself, I don't understand where ranles’ concept of "selfish" comes from. Like a couple others, I am writing about connections. Sure, on outbound flights from the originating city I try to be at the gate anywhere from 60 to 30 minutes before departure. That's a no-brainer.

What is the issue are the connections. I think everyone would agree that the majority of passengers have no control over when a plane leaves or arrives. If I have 30 minutes to connect at a hub, that is pushing it. It takes 10 - 15 minutes to deplane sometimes, and some walks between gates are 10 - 20 minutes.

If the plane closes it's doors early then pax with short connection times could be stuck at the connecting city. If it's the last flight that day, she/he is stuck overnight.

I get the impression that some airlines' scheduling personnel (the folks who schedule these 30-minute layovers) aren't in sync with their operations personnel (who mandate the 5 - 10 minute early door closing). There is just no room for error in this scenario in a business prone to some type of error or delay.

In most businesses, if you sell something that doesn't work, you either make it work or provide some incentive for the customer to keep your product. You can never use the excuse that “I'm sorry, but what we sold you won't work because you were sacrificed for the good of the other customers". Unfortunately, lost time is difficult to put a value on and airlines definitely don’t appreciate a pax’s lost time as much as the pax does.

I know weather delays are not the airlines' fault and I cut them a lot of slack. I realize equipment won't work from time to time but since it does the majority of the time I don't complain (loudly). But please, when you try to fix a problem like late departures, don't create new ones with your solution.

Kind of like what KenHamer said, "I don't care what time a plane departs. I only care when it arrives" [and that I'm on it].

Sorry, I was not more clear. I do not know whose fault it is when a connecting flight comes in late and one does not have enough time to get to the next flight. My point is that it is not the fault of the passengers already on the flight. Why should all of those people be delayed, for one?

Second point is a correction of closing the doors early. If that is the new rule, close the door 5 minutes before backing out of the gate, then that is THE time. One showing up 4 minutes before gate departure is LATE,not just in time.

If it were me I would be very upset having missed my connection, however as stated before, that is not good enough (selfish) to condemn others to be late on my account.

The statement that it does not matter when the plane leaves, but when it gets there has two flaws. First, if one does not care when the plane leaves, then why do we have this thread? Let the plane leave 50 minutes early and still say that. Secondly, it is convenient to say but the later the flight leaves, the more likely it will be late (can we agree on that?)

ranles, your assumption is that if the plane door closes on time, the flight will be late. Not so in my opinion.

Rather than close the doors five minutes early, why don't airlines do the honest thing: schedule the flight 5 minutes earlier?

Regards,

Ken Hamer

This is the honest way. Departure is when they back out of the gate (I believe). You assume that they should keep the doors open until that time. It is not possible to do both. Perhaps this is a recognition of that fact. This really is a half full have empty discussion.

Exactly, more different definitions for the same words, created by/for the airlines. I yearn for the simple old more uniform definitions, when we could more easily understand each other! And knew when to board the plane as well as when it was taking off!

Instead of closing doors early to put the blame on others, why don't the airlines keep to their schedules?

Okay, you win.

The airlines are the blame for everything. Passengers should not be expected to board the plane in time for them to get completely in place, the FA to do their job, the doors get shut, and the plane get clearance to back from the gate.

Those that do abide by the above, should be happy to wait while others, "less early" to board at the last second. After they are more important that the other 200 passengers. I think that is what I hear.

If I get to the resteraunt two minutes before closing time is it reasonable to expect them to serve me from the full menu? After all I got there before they closed.

Jeffs, you will be disappointed if you mean a real place to eat. A fast food will have all the menu (no, that is not right, go to McDonalds at 10:28am and order breakfast. If they have already started cleaning the grill, true in most cases, they will not make hotcakes for you). A real place will have very few items left, as it is necessary to minimize the waste. BUT YOU MISS THE POINT, all the other resturant guests are not asked to stay longer (and miss the opera or whatever) because you come in at the last minute. In many resturants, you will be turned away.

OK, I was evidently a little too obtuse. I was simply trying to make a simple parallel ( not very well I guess) to illustrate the point that you should not show up 2 minutes before departure time and expect to get on the plane. Nuff said.

New York Times

They should waive the policy for connecting passengers if the first flight is late. I had one experience where the first flight was late (airline fault) and could not board the next flight even though I arrived 5 minutes before departure.

That IS a shame. You'd think they would surely waive the rule in such circumstances and it will in fact cost the airlines as well as the pax! Was this international or just domestic as I suspect?

This was domestic on United (last year, before they had this policy, while I was 1K with United). They closed the door more than 5 minutes before the flight, plane then stood at the gate for another 20 minutes.