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I don’t mean to pile on United Airlines, but they do bring it on themselves sometimes. The latest TravelCommons podcast talks about how the “friendly skies” of United Airlines have become a bit thread worn — duct tape holding together armrests, seat backs that can’t stay up (which was my experience again on my Monday flight from ORD to SFO).… Continue Reading →
Recorded in the TravelCommons studios outside of Chicago, back doing my thing to support the travel industry with lots of travel in January. We talk about some recent TSA observations, good and bad; my latest spin of the “travel roulette” wheel, trading the plane for a train in an East Coast snow storm; a look back at last year’s travel… Continue Reading →
In past TravelCommons episodes, we’ve talked about how important it is for a frequent traveler to find good restaurants that welcome a single diner. In spite of a former colleague’s advice to “never eat alone“, I often find myself with nothing but the USA Today as a dining partner. Sure, I could dine in the hotel bar, but I can… Continue Reading →
Recorded in the TravelCommons studios outside of Chicago after finishing up my travel for the year. But there was a good bit of travel before the year-end, including one of the craziest/stupidest(?) itineraries I’ve done in a long time — Chicago-London-Denver in a little more than a day. Many of the subsequent Twitter comments I received asked that perpetual question… Continue Reading →
Recorded in the TravelCommons studios outside of Chicago at the end of yet another busy travel month – Philadelphia, Portland, Denver, Northern Virginia – but am home this week, keeping to one of my cardinal rules of travel – stay out of any airport Thanksgiving week. In this episode, I talk about a successful experiment of going PC-less on a… Continue Reading →
Recorded in the Philadelphia Marriott after a hectic travel month with two trips to Europe and a bunch of travel up and down the US East Coast. In this episode, I talk about a bit of multi-modal travel — some planes, trains, and automobile trips. We have a trio of stories about playing “travel roulette” to avoid flight delays, and… Continue Reading →
Autumn is the only time I willingly book a window seat. Today’s approach into Newark had us flying over the Delaware Water Gap on a clear sunny day. The leaves are beginning to change — I saw dots of yellow and orange and red bursting out of a field of green. It made me reach back for into some old… Continue Reading →
Mika Pyyhkala, a long time TravelCommons listener who works for the National Federation of the Blind of Massachusetts, dropped me a note about a problem he recently had with some new technology installed in New York City cabs. “I was in NYC last Sunday and I took a taxi from La Guardia airport to mid town Manhattan. I noticed that… Continue Reading →
Recorded in the TravelCommons studios outside of Chicago after a month of travel to and from the East Coast. In this episode, a spur-of-the-moment train trip bypasses a huge air traffic control problem. A listener story gets us talking about theft after you entrust your luggage to the folks behind the curtain. I have fun saying the word schadenfreude —… Continue Reading →
Labor Day is the traditional start of US political campaigns and the associated silliness of political speeches. Evan Sparks’ Aviation Policy Blog pointed to a speech by Barack Obama in which he lauds Chinese investment in travel infrastructure — airports, train systems — and asks “Why aren’t we doing the same thing?” It’s a good question, if lack of money… Continue Reading →