By : CLIVE IRVING
You wouldn’t guess it if you are suffering long security lines and indifferent service at America’s airports this holiday season, but all this could soon be a thing of the past. New smart technology in which your face becomes your passport could transform the airport experience.
And everybody agrees that this needs to happen. If there is one song both political parties are singing from the same sheet it is that we need to renew our transport infrastructure before it finally collapses from neglect.
And airports appear to be high on the list.
Listen to President-elect Donald Trump and Vice President Joe Biden. They have both called New York’s LaGuardia airport “Third World” in its wretched standards. That’s probably an insult to a lot of the Third World. As LaGuardia undergoes a $4 billion makeover it’s even more of a nightmare for passengers than it was before.
Billionaires and politicians can, of course, make invidious comparisons like this because they get to see how these things are done in other parts of the world. Bear in mind, too, that Trump and Biden are both accustomed to VIP fast-tracking. But passengers who only fly domestically in the U.S. don’t have any means of knowing if the miseries they now accept as routine—long lines, overcrowded lounges, chaos when boarding—are the same around the world.
