4 - Wednesday, December 16, 1987 ~ North Shore New

fear, i: is the lineups.

The flying itself is bliss. J love
it, except for the claustrophobia.

A lot of people must feel that
way —— that’s why first class is
the goal of any sane flying

prime joy.

Mostly, on international
flights, one passes through night-
time. In the darkness, even, a
mighty 747, technology’s raost
wonderous child, can get almosi
confining after several hours.’

The airlines have been adroit at
finding ways io keep their pas-
sengers calin, given the weird-
ness, from an evolutionary point
of view, of a wingless biped
reading Maclean's seven miles
over Saskatoon.

I look forward eagerly to the
day when they simply stack us in
comfortable pods, put us into a
dream trance of our choice, and
wake us up at the other end in
our hotel room.

It will have to corze to that or
else something.is goiug to have to
give. Air traffic ix; ahem, sky-
rocketing. / ‘

There are mad predictions of
the number of -air, travellers
doubling’ in the next 12! years.
The growth rate is seven per cent
per year right now.

I have trouble believing projec-
tions any more. Remember. how
| London was to have been in-
evitably buried in horse excre-
; :

Deposit $5000

human being. The service is nice, .
but it’s the extra space that is the’

Bob Hunter

@ strictly personal ©

MY EXPECTATIONS about air travel have diminished
slightly in the last couple of years. It is not the flying I

ment by the turn of the century,
according to Malthus.

Any reports of the demise of
air travel due to overcrowding, or
anything else, have to be scanned
for exaggeration.

Nevertheless, there can be no
doubt that airports are reaching a
saturation point and that at the
moment there is no relief in sight.

Nobody living anywhere near
an airport wants to allow it to
expand. It is politically extremely
unpopular.

Yet the terminals bulge. In ad.
dition to customs lineups and
ticket lineups at the kiosks and
even the urinals, there are now
usually awful waiting periods in
the lounges.

I remember covering the open-
ing of the new Winnipeg interna-
tional airport back in 1963. I got
to walk around by myself inside
the place before the ribbon was
snipped. I was awestruck by the
size.. Surely they had overbuilt!

They had not. In fact, they had
underbuilt. The problem isn’t as
bad in Canada, even though I
have experienced hour-long
delays getting through the Van-
couver airport. In Europe and
the United States, much longer
waits have become almost
routine.

1 got held up from 9 a.m. to
noon in a jam-up at the Seattle
airport a couple of years ago.

That is one hell of a long time

trapped with several hundred

of more in any CanWest Trust account, for a

people in a narrow corridor. Talk
about claustrophobia! The
wonder was that nobody peed
themselves.

A two-hour wait to get through
Gatwick Airport last summer was
about par for the course for the
U.K. these days, J gather. So far,
1987 has already set records for
delays.

People in the vast queues ure
numb with boredom, exhaustion
and tension. They have hardly
even a groan left in them.

No matter how efficient the
airlines and everybody else in-
volved may be, no matter how
hard they try, there is that point
of entry where the bureaucrats
have utter control — and that’s
where the bottlenecks form.

{ think a terrific place for
privatization to start would be
Customs and Immigration. No
kidding. It seems to me absurd
that paperwork involving pass-
ports can’t be handled in the
computer age well in advance of
boarding, exit or entry.

The same th.ng goes for pur-
chase of tickets. The paperwork
should all be done before anyone
gets near the airport itself.

A ritual of mass humiliation is
what occurs right now whenever
you try to cross a border. It
serves mostly the ends of the civil
servants who man the customs
and immigration departments. It
could be 90 per cent avoided, I’m
sure,

Baggage handling could like-
wise be expedited by letting peo-
ple ship their luggage on separate
all-baggage flights, a measure
that would incidentally al] but
eliminate the risk of a bomb.
What is the point of terrorists
blowing up a planeful of suntan
lotion and underwear?

Whatever actions are taken, it
is time for innovations in air
travel to eliminate some of the
bureaucratic hurdles. The flow of
traffic is too great to be process-
ed as though people were still
disembarking from four-masters
at a wooden dock.

ininimum of 80 days and walk away with a Sony Walkman

AM/FM stereo radio**

“Per annum Rate subject to change without notice

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Right on the Money!

CanWest Trust

Member Canada Deposit Insurance Corporation

North Vancouver
1452 Lonsdale Avenue
980-7440

West Vancouver
{718 Marine Orive
926-3020

WOOLCO
CORRECTION NOTICE

Re: The CHRISTMAS GIFTS flyer that ap-
peared Dec. 16, 1987,

Page 6 — The Home Spa shown Is Incor-
rect. 4200 is tha model being advertised.
Page 6 — Dus to circumstances beyond
our control the “CHARLESCRAFI” Hair
Crimper will nol be available.
Remington Micro Screan Cord Shaver will
not be available.

CGE AM/FM personal cassatte will nat be
avattable.

Wootco sincerely regrets any Incenve-
nience that this may cause Its customers.

Dr. Mark Cousins
Naturopathic Physician

#405-1124 Lonsdale Ave.
For appointment call:

984-0040 * 984-8863

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