I'm Baaack - and More Heathrow Woes

Just like it says on the tin, I'm back from Ottawa, I've had a couple of hours sleep, a cup of coffee. a piece of my mum's Bakewell Tart (that she made for BB), I've made a lamb stew and I've managed to post the email that had been piling up while I was away, since, even though I had an excellent WiFi connection in my hotel room in Ottawa, for some reason I could collect mail but not send it. I suspect this is something weird going on with Demon, my ISP for thirteen years, now, and pretty good most of the time, but terrible for international travel.

So... more Heathrow Woes?

Well, yes, but not as bad as on the way out, however I have to say that their system for looking after folks who don't walk so fast, or walk so well is UTTER CRAP. (There are moving walkways, but only on the final strip between gates, not in the rest of the terminal building.) I've never explored this before. I've always just gritted my teeth and hiked, but I've usually had BB to give me a hand with hand-baggage if necessary. I didn't really need assistance this time. I mean, I can walk so it's a borderline thing, but I do have a bad knee (courtesy of a torn ligament some years ago) and a lot of fast (for me) walking tends to aggravate it and I suffer for it for days afterwards. Plus I still have the remains of the underfoot blisters acquired on the outbound journey. So with the time factor added in as well, I thought I'd see what could be done to make my transit through Heathrow a more pleasant and less stressful experience. I only had a two hour turnaround for making my connection, which sounds a lot, but it took every minute of two and a half hours to make my connection outbound with a combination of walking time and queuing time,

So I asked on check-in at Ottawa (delightfully small and easy airport) and was told that they'd arrange a passenger cart to collect me at the landing gate at Heathrow Terminal Three. This happened and it was fine. It saved the long hike from the gate to the transfer bus that was to take me to Terminal One... however... the cart could get no closer than the top of the escalator leading down to the T3 bus station.

Now I can walk so walking down the escalator, wheeling my heavy laptop/briefcase and waiting for the bus wasn't a problem. I never expected the cart to take me door to door, BUT, having requested special assistance I was abandoned completely at that point. They never bothered to ascertain why I needed assistance, so as far as they were concerned I could have been someone with a heart problem or any number of muscular-skeletal conditions.

So I was fine, but out of cussedness and curiosity I decided to follow through and see what else was available for the walking wounded on my transit. As it turns out the answer was: nothing. When I got off the bus at T1 and enquired at the special assistance desk I was told that there were no passenger carts at this terminal. Simply none. Had I been desperately ill, immobile or willing to sit in a wheelchair regardless - which is complete overkill and totally unnecessary for someone with a bad knee and temporary blisters - I could have requested special assistance, but otherwise... Nothing.

Admittedly I was fine. Having saved the longish walk at T3 and also gained some time on the first leg of the transfer, I was still plenty fit enough to manage the longish walk at T1 (no moving walkways in this part of the airport). Also the queues for immigration and for security were much shorter than on the outbound journey (hardly any wait at all as opposed to standing in line for half an hour) so I had plenty of time to amble slowly to the gate.

However there are a lot of people out there who are not wheelchair cases and who would be horrified to be offered a wheelchair, but whose walking speed and comfort zone is not up to transiting Heathrow at the velocity required to make their connections in a pain-free, stress-free manner. Other huge airports have much better transit systems. Newark, New Jersey, has a brilliant little monorail system to transfer passengers between the three terminals, the bus stop and the car rental hubs. Admittedly it's busy, but it's easy to get at and it's regular so that people move through the system quickly and relatively stress free.

So marks out of ten for Heathrow: Outbound 1/10 (and that's being generous because I did actually catch my flight) and inbound 4/10. Come on, Heathrow. I challenge you to make it easy for people, they are, after all, your customers. You're the biggest airport in the world, so figure out how to move people effectively without exhausting them, stressing them out and delivering them to their holiday or business destination tired and sore.

I'm Baaack - and More Heathrow Woes

Just like it says on the tin, I'm back from Ottawa, I've had a couple of hours sleep, a cup of coffee. a piece of my mum's Bakewell Tart (that she made for BB), I've made a lamb stew and I've managed to post the email that had been piling up while I was away, since, even though I had an excellent WiFi connection in my hotel room in Ottawa, for some reason I could collect mail but not send it. I suspect this is something weird going on with Demon, my ISP for thirteen years, now, and pretty good most of the time, but terrible for international travel.

So... more Heathrow Woes?

Well, yes, but not as bad as on the way out, however I have to say that their system for looking after folks who don't walk so fast, or walk so well is UTTER CRAP. (There are moving walkways, but only on the final strip between gates, not in the rest of the terminal building.) I've never explored this before. I've always just gritted my teeth and hiked, but I've usually had BB to give me a hand with hand-baggage if necessary. I didn't really need assistance this time. I mean, I can walk so it's a borderline thing, but I do have a bad knee (courtesy of a torn ligament some years ago) and a lot of fast (for me) walking tends to aggravate it and I suffer for it for days afterwards. Plus I still have the remains of the underfoot blisters acquired on the outbound journey. So with the time factor added in as well, I thought I'd see what could be done to make my transit through Heathrow a more pleasant and less stressful experience. I only had a two hour turnaround for making my connection, which sounds a lot, but it took every minute of two and a half hours to make my connection outbound with a combination of walking time and queuing time,

So I asked on check-in at Ottawa (delightfully small and easy airport) and was told that they'd arrange a passenger cart to collect me at the landing gate at Heathrow Terminal Three. This happened and it was fine. It saved the long hike from the gate to the transfer bus that was to take me to Terminal One... however... the cart could get no closer than the top of the escalator leading down to the T3 bus station.

Now I can walk so walking down the escalator, wheeling my heavy laptop/briefcase and waiting for the bus wasn't a problem. I never expected the cart to take me door to door, BUT, having requested special assistance I was abandoned completely at that point. They never bothered to ascertain why I needed assistance, so as far as they were concerned I could have been someone with a heart problem or any number of muscular-skeletal conditions.

So I was fine, but out of cussedness and curiosity I decided to follow through and see what else was available for the walking wounded on my transit. As it turns out the answer was: nothing. When I got off the bus at T1 and enquired at the special assistance desk I was told that there were no passenger carts at this terminal. Simply none. Had I been desperately ill, immobile or willing to sit in a wheelchair regardless - which is complete overkill and totally unnecessary for someone with a bad knee and temporary blisters - I could have requested special assistance, but otherwise... Nothing.

Admittedly I was fine. Having saved the longish walk at T3 and also gained some time on the first leg of the transfer, I was still plenty fit enough to manage the longish walk at T1 (no moving walkways in this part of the airport). Also the queues for immigration and for security were much shorter than on the outbound journey (hardly any wait at all as opposed to standing in line for half an hour) so I had plenty of time to amble slowly to the gate.

However there are a lot of people out there who are not wheelchair cases and who would be horrified to be offered a wheelchair, but whose walking speed and comfort zone is not up to transiting Heathrow at the velocity required to make their connections in a pain-free, stress-free manner. Other huge airports have much better transit systems. Newark, New Jersey, has a brilliant little monorail system to transfer passengers between the three terminals, the bus stop and the car rental hubs. Admittedly it's busy, but it's easy to get at and it's regular so that people move through the system quickly and relatively stress free.

So marks out of ten for Heathrow: Outbound 1/10 (and that's being generous because I did actually catch my flight) and inbound 4/10. Come on, Heathrow. I challenge you to make it easy for people, they are, after all, your customers. You're the biggest airport in the world, so figure out how to move people effectively without exhausting them, stressing them out and delivering them to their holiday or business destination tired and sore.