Richard N. Velotta
Travel + Leisure magazine asked its readers to weigh in on the nation’s best airports, and, not surprisingly, McCarran International Airport fared well.
Imagine what they’ll say when they get a look at Terminal 3 this summer.
Readers were asked to rate 22 major airports in seven categories: flight timeliness, design, amenities, food and drink, check-in and security, service, and transportation and location. Not surprisingly, location, location, location bumped McCarran up.
On the T+L report card, McCarran checked in at No. 7 overall. It had the best location among airports surveyed, its free Wi-Fi helped boost it to fifth for amenities, and its check-in and security lines were fast enough to be ranked seventh, but its baggage handling came in at 10th. Terminal cleanliness and design was 14th, and readers didn’t think too highly of what the airport has installed for children. (Readers apparently didn’t get the memo that Las Vegas is more about adults than kids.)
When Terminal 3 opens its doors in late June, readers will be dazzled by the design, and check-in and security should get even better.
The magazine also snagged some figures from the Bureau of Transportation Statistics on flight delays that didn’t do McCarran any favors.
Using numbers compiled last November, McCarran came in as the fourth worst airport for flight delays with 21.8 percent of the airport’s operations departing late. For the bureau’s purposes, a flight is late anytime it goes out more than 15 minutes past the scheduled departure time.
There are several reasons why McCarran is so lackluster in that category. Being in the West, Las Vegas is more susceptible to delays that occur east of it. Anytime there are tornadoes in the Midwest, snow in Denver, ice storms in Atlanta or other foul weather in Washington or New York, it wreaks havoc on Las Vegas’ flight schedules.Because Las Vegas has nonstop flights to 145 destinations, there are more chances for weather to be a problem. It could be a perfect day in Las Vegas, but bad weather somewhere else could result in a scheduling pileup.
Another factor in the high percentage of delayed flights is due to heavy dominance of Southwest Airlines at McCarran.
As Southwest has grown, its on-time performance has slipped. In 2009, it was the third-best airline for punctuality with 83 percent of its flights leaving on time. By 2010, it dropped to No. 5 with 81.5 percent on time. Last year, it fell to No. 13 with 77.7 percent.
Knowing Southwest, this is something that will be fixed in the future. But the fact that the No. 13 on-time performance airline represents nearly 45 percent of McCarran’s daily schedule would tend to pull performance down.
Two of the three airports that have worse on-time performance also are big Southwest airports — No. 1 Chicago Midway Airport (29.9 percent of its flights late) and No. 2 Baltimore-Washington International (23.2 percent late).
Incidentally, the third-worst airport for on-time performance has chronic weather issues. San Francisco International, located right on San Francisco Bay, deals with fog delays on a regular basis.
While Midway, BWI and San Francisco have bad on-time performance, it didn’t seem to affect T+L readers’ overall feelings about those airports. San Francisco and Baltimore-Washington finished ahead of McCarran in the survey, checking in at No. 5 and No. 6, respectively.
The top four, according to readers, were Minneapolis-St. Paul International, Charlotte, Detroit and Orlando International. Rounding out the top 10 were Seattle, Denver and Miami. Seattle-Tacoma International, incidentally, had the best on-time performance among the nation’s airports with only 13.1 percent of its flights delayed.
Portland, Ore., and Ronald Reagan Washington National were a close second and third for punctuality.
The five worst airports, according to the survey, were Newark, N.J., New York’s John F. Kennedy International, Philadelphia, Los Angeles International and New York’s LaGuardia International.
The top five on-time airlines last year were Hawaiian (92.7 percent of its flights on time, which speaks highly of operating in small, uncomplicated airports and in great weather), Alaska (a big player in Seattle and Portland), United (how did that happen?), AirTran (now owned by Southwest) and Mesa (a small commuter carrier).
One other surprise in the airline punctuality ratings was that JetBlue, regarded by many as their favorite carrier, finished last with only 72 percent of its flights leaving on time.