Airports can make or break a holiday

[NoOneKnowsWhoYouAre]

I've just got back from Marrakesh. Had a lovely few days, but the peace and serenity of the entire holiday was totally ruined by the shit show that is Marrakesh Airport. It felt like it was designed to suck the life out of you piece by piece. Or queue by godammed queue.

The queues started to get into the drop off zone. It took 20 mins to get to the drop off area from the entry to it.

Then you queue to get through the doors of the airport. That took 10 minutes as they xrayed everyone's bags.

Then you queue to check in, another 15 mins. You can't check in online, we'll you can but then it has to be printed and validated at the airport

The you queue for security, that only took 10 mins, where they xray your bag again.

The you queued for passport control. This took forever. Almost an hour. It was genuinely horrendous, made worse by the fact I had an upset stomach and thought I might vomit.

Then as you leave passport control, they checked your passport again!! So bloody weird.

The they charge you nearly £4 for a bottle of coke in the shops. And if you need the toilet you get to queue again.

The you queue again at the gate, where they check your passport and boarding pass then send you outside where, they check your passport again(!!) whilst you yet again queue.

I travel all the time, I go to Morocco regularly, but I will never set foot in Marrakesh airport again as long as I live. It was horrendous. It felt designed to break you.

A shit airport can absolutely ruin a holiday, am I right??

Has anyone else had a worse experience at an airport?

Just looked up passenger numbers for 2023, Heathrow 79million, Schipol 62m, Changi 60million, Manchester 30 million. Changi is 17th busiest in the world so pretty up there - I wouldn’t call that middling though a handful are admittedly significantly busier.

Manchester in particular could learn a thing or two about an airport that easily handles double its amount of passengers.

@Clearinguptheclutter

- I wouldn’t call that middling though a handful are admittedly significantly busier.

It’s obviously an opinion thing but for context for the POV of operating aircraft into/out of major airports Changi was usually one of the more straightforward places to visit, mainly down to the relative lack of traffic verses the real biggies in some places in the US/Europe/Gulf…

It was getting slightly busier a few years backs with the rise of the regional LoCos but the airport authority has done a really good job at maintaining/improving appearance standards and facilities, unlike the authorities in some places.

@Clearinguptheclutter

sorry to retag you but re:

Manchester in particular could learn a thing or two about an airport that easily handles double its amount of passengers

The problem a lot of European/US airports that are based on a 40s footprint (e.g. Manchester, Heathrow) have is that the best solution would be to start again…possibly by building on a completely new plot…

That’s what has gone on in places like Beijing (twice in my lifetime) Denver, Hong Kong and more recently Istanbul.

Trying to keep operations going and the cash coming in without reducing terminal capacity is tough to almost impossible unless your airport is blessed with lots of adjacent available free space that is free for development, and a political system that is permissive to such development……

@notimagain
yes I agree with you here.
places like Manchester can only do so much with limited space, old buildings and the very complicated planning system we have in place here should they want to expand further onto surrounding (green belt) land. OTOH I understand Singapore and many Arab nations to be the sorts of places where those in power decide what gets built, whether locals agree to it or not.

That all said, there is no excuse at all for the downright rudeness that you so often get at places like Manchester and sometimes just downright shabiness. You don’t need a sparkling glass terminal to employ polite and friendly staff, and get the toilets cleaned.

@Clearinguptheclutter

That all said, there is no excuse at all for the downright rudeness that you so often get at places like Manchester and sometimes just downright shabiness.

Agreed.

I understand Singapore and many Arab nations to be the sorts of places where those in power decide what gets built, whether locals agree to it or not.

Probably one classic example is Hong Kong…Bit of a joint Brit/Chinese effort, at least initially as far as politics and planning goes but the rough sequence was-

Kai Tak no longer adequate (and it really wasn’t great).
Choose completely new site (Chek Lap Kok)
Flatten half a mountain and island to reclaim land then build airport on it.
On moving night close old airport, drive all the ground kit several tens of kilometers to new airport and open for business….

From breaking ground to opening 7ish years…but would we want to live under that political system?

Exeter is the best airport but only because it is so quiet which means you can’t go many places from there.

Rio de Janeiro airport is pretty awful. We had a a few hours there whilst waiting for a connection. There are literally NO seats. We asked someone where the seating was... he said there wasn't any. It's just shop after shop after shop. We just sat on the floor because we were knackered.

I flew from Koh Samui back to Bangkok, totally agree it was so nice!! And Singapore airport is my absolute favourite, l was delighted our flight got delayed cos we got to spend longer there!

Stansted is my local airport but it is nowhere near big enough for the number of passengers