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Comment by jeffwass | Hacker News Reader

Even in your own car dropping off your friends or family at a UK airport (at least the London ones) requires paying a £6 fee now. Just to get to the dropoff area, even for 30 seconds as you say.

But hey, at least the luggage carts are free…

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In Edinburgh the (small, we often need 2) luggage carts are now £2.

At Edinburgh airport, you can park at the Park and Ride nearby but it costs a tenner to get from there to the airport - a distance you could walk in about 20 minutes.

Right, but what do you think the alternative is? There is limited space close to the entrance of the terminal, it has to be rationed somehow. Also what happens in practice is people take advantage. A trust-based 30s wouldn't work. Even with the current fees you can hang around Heathrow drop off and see the police having to move people along, check unatended cars, etc.

There's limited space everywhere. It is rationed by people not wanting to be there. There's limited space at the baggage claim but nobody is charging you to be at the baggage claim.

You think people don't want to drop off at the airport? There's literally a multi storey full of short term parking at every Heathrow terminal. They wouldn't fit in the drop off area at all.

You are charged to be at the baggage claim. The airline pays it on your behalf, from your fare.

you are not charged to be at the baggage claim

If you can find a way to utilize the baggage claim services without paying someone at some point I'd love to hear it.

Just because you're not handing someone your card as you walk up to it doesn't mean you're not paying for it.

nevertheless you are not charged to be at the baggage claim. You can stand there as long as you want to, and your bank balance doesn't decrease.

Baggage claim being run by a charity, obviously.

> nobody is charging you to be at the baggage claim

Not yet.

The alternative is not charging. JFK somehow manages. Yes there's traffic, but it keeps slowly moving.

JFK is pure hell compared to Heathrow, never mind to an actually well-run airport. I'll stick to paying for my externalities.

I have three major airports in reasonable driving distance. None of them charge money to pick up or drop off at the terminal. It works fine.

And what's your experience of other world airports? Have you been to Heathrow? What about somewhere like Changi? It's not just the dropoff that sucks at JFK.

Public realm is almost universally terrible in America because Americans rarely leave and don't experience anything better. It's bad, actually, to wait in traffic for a large portion of your life.

See also: the revolt over NYC congestion pricing. The congestion fee in Manhattan should be $50 or more.

I've only transited through Heathrow, I haven't tried the driving experience there. I have tried it in various other airports in Europe and China. None of them charged money to drive up to the terminal either and they were all fine too.

Sometimes the American experience isn't different from the rest of the world and it's your experience that's unusual, you know.

You understand that e.g. in Chinese cities they restrict car ownership and you have to enter a lottery/bidding system to get valid plates. Cars are a luxury. European cities have their own restrictions and discouragements. Rationing happens in many ways.

I have still never experienced an airport with pick-up/drop-off traffic as bad as JFK, and I've travelled to almost every country in Europe, plenty of countries in Asia, and Canada. Maybe South America can beat it though, TBD.

That's probably a "JFK is unusually bad" thing, not an "everything is terrible in America and those idiot Americans don't know any better because they never travel" thing. I haven't been driven to JFK since 2001 and I don't remember what it was like then, but driving anywhere around NYC requires great patience.

London is worse _overall_ for traffic than NYC, so I don't think it's that. I like America and Americans, but it's a fact that they don't travel much. JFK is not just bad for drop-off, it's chaos and run-down in general.

Many of us travel internationally quite a bit. And again, this thing you think is uniquely American very much is not.

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