Tag: travel
-
Rent-a-Wreck, or at least Rent-a-Stained
For the past couple of months, I’ve been wondering if it has been my bad luck with Hertz or the rental car industry trying to stretch their cars a bit farther. A recent article in the Wall Street Journal assuaged my paranoia. Though Hertz claims their fleet age hasn’t changed, the owners of National, Alamo, Continue Reading →
-
Podcast #57 – Making Time for Local Fare; What’s Standing in the Way of Fixing Our Airports
Recorded in the TravelCommons studio outside Chicago, I’ve been bi-coastal since the last episode, bouncing between New York and San Francisco. A side trip down to Philadelphia yields a great street-food breakfast when I take the time to walk outside my hotel. Delays in my flights between O’Hare and LaGuardia airports cause me to dig Continue Reading →
-
Local Fare Eases Delays Just A Bit
Sitting in Philadelphia Airport drinking a pint of Hop Hog IPA beer from the Lancaster Brewing Company in nearby Lancaster, PA reminded me of a recent USA Today article about the growth of local food fare in airports. According to the article: “There was a trend toward national brands in the 1990s, but now there’s Continue Reading →
-
United’s Customer Service in a Free Fall
The drumbeat of complaints regarding United Airline’s deteriorating customer service continues. In the Trade Your Bags For Another $1/Hr post, I mentioned the results of the recent University of Michigan customer satisfaction survey. If the satisfaction index for the airline industry in general plummeted — they’re now just barely ahead of the IRS — then Continue Reading →
-
Can’t Outsource Responsibility
The Chicago Tribune‘s Sunday Business section featured a 3,600-word in-depth analysis of a United Airlines flight that went terribly wrong. United Flight 1073 was supposed to leave Montego Bay, Jamaica at 1:55pm on Saturday, March 31, 2007. It didn’t leave the ground until the following Monday, April 2. The article is a very good read, Continue Reading →