Why??

As video conferencing becomes cheaper and easier to use, thankfully most of the knuckleheads wont need to fly In AK, remote villages can perform emergency surgery via satellite link with Anchorage.

Yep, and we knuckleheads who travel for business won't need to deal with TSA jerks. Sounds like a win-win situation.

And if it helps put them out of a job, even a bigger win.

Unfortunately, the TSA jerks will continue to be employed, even when the number of passengers no longer justifies (or pays the bills for) their presence.

There isn't a single airport in the US I've visited that wouldn't grind to a halt if something as stupid as this was instituted.

#1 As said by RichardKenner, ticket counters are made for buying (guess what) TICKETS. Or what do you mean with "documents"? Passport, party member card, the official TSA travel permit, ...?

Or are you by any chance confusing "ticket counter" and "check-in desk"?

#2 You are probably preparing us for that "Official TSA travel permit" that we will have to request on-line... I remember certain Eastern European countries where you needed a permit to travel outside your own city... Getting closer... (If we let people like you have their wish )


Nothing to do with airport security (at least not the type you are thinking of) ... But I know airports where this is already checked to avoid other people getting away with your luggage.

#3 Right... Maybe if we kept non-travelers of the streets...

That said, there are lots of airports where there is a security check before entering the airport building or the check-in area. HKT (Phuket) and SAH (Sana'a) are 2 examples I remember...

Personally, I think this is a wonderful idea but I would carry it one step further -- nobody would be allowed to go to the ticket counter unless he can show that he has a valid boarding pass.

One step further- you can only enter the airport at your destination.

Remember, at TSA appearances are important...If you are seen leaving an airport, it will look like you traveled safely.

... unless you can produce a proof of departure from your originating airport, in which case you will not be allowed into your destination airport…

Unless you provide video of yourself packing and dressing, taken by a TSA certified safety inspector. After posting on U-tube, viewers will vote on allowing you to fly.

It wasn't quite what the OP suggested, but at the old terminal at IND, the only accessible part of the terminal that the general public could get into was the ticketing/check-in counters. If my memory serves me correctly, there was a news stand and a coffee shop. To get to anything else, you had to go through the checkpoint.

Now, at the new terminal, you can walk in, and go up the escalator to Civic Plaza, where there is a food court and then the checkpoints are on the left and right side of the food court leading to the gate areas.

With the OP's suggestion, even at an airport the size of IND, security would take forever. Civic Plaza is always packed with both travellers and non-travellers. It's a good place to get a bite to eat (and not really expensive) while saying good-bye to loved ones or just relaxing before heading to the gate.

It would also make the following thigns very difficult:
-screening those passengers, given that TSO's aren't travelling
-dispatching flights given that flight OPs/GAs aren't travelling

I'm not trying to be sarcastic (ok...not entirely), I'm trying to make a point about people in general using more specific language when they discuss things like air security/safety.

On a more practical note, this is actually a bad idea when used to 'combat terrorism'. The point of terrorism is to disrupt as much as it is to kill. Thats why 9/11 was so successful. Now we have taken to solving that problem by creating huge pileups at airports in the name of security. It honestly surprises me that no one has attempted a serious terrorist attack ON a check point line on a monday morning at a major international hub like IAD, JFk, LAX, etc. That would likely cause something like you suggested to be implemented. The end result of THAT would be that not only are the lines now worse, but it means that the lines are now outside. Think about the effect a car/truck bomb would have on a large group of people standing at the curb waiting to get into the terminal.

The point of all this is two fold. First, most of these calls for extra security are ineffective because of poor execution of security and poor intelligence operations which are what creates security holes in the first place. Plugging ineptness with more hassle isn't a solution. More accuracy, more accountability, and more common sense need to be applied. Not only is this important from an annoyance standpoint, but when the poicies you have in place fail because of people, more policies can't solve anything.

Second, many of these security measures actually put the traveling public in a lot higher danger. Lets say you have a 1 in 1 billion chance of being on a plane attacked by terrorists. ATL had almost 1 million flights out of it last year. Something like 2500 a day. Thats >100 an hour. The odds of you being exposed to a terrorist attack at an airport, are therefore roughly 100 times higher (obviously this is ghetto math). And, it would likely be more succesful especially at this point in time because more people are there waiting at the checkpoint. Further, think about the pyschological impact of attacking the security checkpoint. No longer will people be made to feel safer by the TSA, they will feel under threat the entire time they are at a checkpoint. The chaos between the TSA and the traveling public this would cause would be spectacularly self destructive on all sides.

Suicide bombers in other countries usually attack in public spaces- government offices, checkpoints, buses, markets, cafes and other crowd gathering places. We seem to have this biased paranoia about airports, and airplanes in particular, the checkpoints themselves are vulnerable. Even destroying the entrance to a terminal (or several in different locations) would be a very effective act of terror.