Things are looking up for those traveling through New York’s John F. Kennedy International Airport on Delta Air Lines. After years of planning, and as part of a $1.4 billion investment, the carrier and partners opened a shiny new terminal today.
Under the 360,000-square-foot expansion, Delta says that the company not only renovated check-in areas and other facilities, but also added nine new gates, new retail and dining offerings, a 24,000-square-foot Delta Sky Club with a rooftop terrace and an improved baggage handling system. In addition to the expansion opening today, a second phase of redevelopment will bring 11 more gates, upping the total number to 27 upon completion in summer 2015.
The renovated terminal primes Delta to take (even more) advantage of the largest hub of aviation activity in the United States, New York. Delta says the company provides service to more destinations from New York than any other airline, and is also investing more than $160 million to expand and update their terminals at LaGuardia Airport.
To get a better look at JFK’s Terminal 4, check out the video after the jump.
You know the drill. Mid-sized city revives a long-dormant warehouse district with art galleries, a baseball park, hipster bars, food trucks, even a Spaghetti Warehouse. Locals love it, then brace for a tourism boom that doesn’t really come.
But Tulsa’s reviving Brady District is different. It has Woody Guthrie.
In truth, this city in the Oklahoma hills where I grew up hasn’t offered much outside appeal since the oil wells dried up or Route 66 became a toll road. And for decades, the Brady, across the tracks from downtown, was the quietest, darkest place in a town better known for its TV evangelist Oral Roberts. In fact, the Brady might have been left for good if not for a couple classic music venues, including Cain’s Ballroom, where Bob Wills put swing into country music in the ’30s.
Now the once-abandoned red-brick townhouses are home to glass-blowing schools, violin shops, falafel stands, cafes, outdoor films and yoga classes, and even the Hanson brothers’ studio 3CG. Nora Guthrie, the frizzy haired daughter of the legendary folk hero, calls this area the perfect place for the new Woody Guthrie Center. “It’s like SoHo in 1969 to 1971,” she says of her former New York neighborhood. “There’s this budding creativity, not caring about a specific idea, just a notion to do something.”
In other words, Woody would approve.And that’s nice considering his home state long didn’t approve of him. Born in 1912 in Okemah (a 70-minute drive southwest), Woody wrote roughly 3000 songs before succumbing to Huntington’s Disease at 55 in 1967. Soon afterwards, Okemah’s little library refused the family’s offers to house a donation of Woody’s items due to the singer’s perceived “commie” leanings. (Never mind that, at the time of Woody’s birth in 1912, one in five Okies voted socialist.)
Lucky for Tulsa, it turns out. Across from Guthrie Green, the center is part museum, part archives. Its exhibits tell the tale of some of the rambler’s homes, including the Texas panhandle, Los Angeles and his final home New York City.
In an hour or two, you can peek at Bob Dylan’s hand-written scrawl of his 1961 “Song to Woody” or Woody’s fiddle marked with his well-known WWII-era slogan (“this machine kills fascists”), then see videos on the Dust Bowl, which prompted the westward Okie migration that Woody sung about on his first album “The Dust Bowl Ballads” (1940).
The heart of the center, philosophically and spatially, is devoted to “This Land is Your Land,” written near Times Square in 1943 as a sort of rebuttal to a song Woody loathed, “God Bless America.” Videos show many of the renditions of the song, including a funny German version and a bouncy Glen Campbell singing along in the ’60s in the most fanciful of green kerchiefs.
Nearby are plenty of ways to expand a day. At Valkyrie, a roomy lounge that was once used as a location in the film Rumblefish, young Tulsa entrepreneurs sip cocktails and local microbrews and debate local questions like whether Hanson are good tippers. One offered me some Oklahoma-shaped dog biscuits she makes from beer. A couple doors down, the Tavern on Brady plays up its Prohibition-era incarnation in look, but goes all-out mod in cuisine. I went with a surprisingly good banh mi salad, a breadless take on the Vietnamese sandwich with a faithful dousing of fish sauce.
If you go, look to stay at The Mayo, a ’20s art deco hotel that reopened a few years ago, and pick up Benjamin Lytal’s excellent new novel, “A Map of Tulsa,” which plays out downtown and the Brady District in the ’90s. If you write, or like those who do, spend an early Friday evening at the classic Tulsa Press Club downtown, where Tulsa World beat reporters and the like assemble to drink and talk the written word.
Just like the old days.
Robert Reid (www.reidontravel.com) grew up in Tulsa. His first time to the Brady was in the summer of ’83, when Alfie Mizer needed company to see some band from Ireland called U2. Though just as moved as Alfie, Robert didn’t rip apart his matching Ozzy concert shirt during “Sunday Bloody Sunday.”
Travelers’ rights are often difficult to define. We know about the so-called Airline Passenger Bill of Rights, designed to give air travelers some relief in a deregulated airline industry when things go wrong. When held on the tarmac for too long, passengers now have the right to get off the aircraft. Bumped against your will? You might be entitled to denied boarding compensation in the form of a check or cash. But what about cruise travelers? What rights do they have when things go wrong? The new Cruise Industry Passenger Bill Of Rights has answers.
Released this week by the Cruise Lines International Association (CLIA), the cruise industry organization that includes cruise lines, industry suppliers and travel agencies, the Cruise Industry Passenger Bill Of Rights details what should happen when things go wrong on a cruise ship. Unlike the airline version though, the cruise passenger bill of rights is more of an explanation of what cruise lines normally and customarily have been doing, as opposed to a set of laws for which fines can be levied against a cruise line that breaks them.
Still, there is value to cruise travelers in what the bill holds, if for no other reason than to educate buyers about what to expect. Experts agree.
“CLIA’s Passenger Bill of Rights is a very good policy for passengers and the cruise industry as it crystallizes rights and responsibilities in a consistent manner across all member cruise lines,” cruise expert Stewart Chiron, CEO of CruiseGuy told Gadling.
“The Cruise Industry Passenger Bill of Rights codifies many longstanding practices of CLIA members and goes beyond those to further inform cruise guests of the industry’s commitment to their comfort and care,” said Christine Duffy, president and CEO of CLIA in a press release this week.
Indeed, the full text of CLIA’s Bill addresses issues that may have kept first-time cruise travelers, concerned about recent headlines ranging from the grounding of Costa Concordia to the sensationalized Carnival Triumph “poop cruise” event, from booking their first cruise vacation. The bill covers 10 rights that passengers now have when sailing a CLIA-member cruise line, and it does a good job of easing the concerns of travelers new to the world of cruise vacations.
“By formally adopting industry practices into a ‘Passenger Bill of Rights,’ CLIA is further demonstrating consistent practices and transparency across CLIA member lines. The cruise industry is committed to continuing to deliver against the high standards we set for ourselves in all areas of shipboard operations,” said Duffy.
Passenger rights include the ability to disembark a ship if essential provisions can not be provided, sailing with a crew trained in emergency procedures and insuring that ships have an emergency power source in the case of a main generator failure.
Further validation of CLIA’s Passenger Bill of Rights may be gained by its possible adoption by the International Maritime Organization (IMO), United Nations specialized agency charged with improving maritime safety and preventing pollution from ships.
The Cruise Passenger Bill of Rights is the latest effort by CLIA to focus on passenger safety, comfort and care. Previous, recent efforts include an industry-wide Operational Safety Review in 2012 and a Preparedness Risk Assessment in 2013 along with a complex multi-agency cruise disaster drill, called Operation Black Swan, held last month.
“Despite the fact that most major cruise lines exceed these provisions, it lays the foundation for consistency, peace of mind and continued evolution of a maturing industry,” concludes Chiron.
Here is the text of the International Cruise Line Passenger Bill of Rights:
The Members of the Cruise Lines International Association are dedicated to the comfort and care of all passengers on oceangoing cruises throughout the world. To fulfill this commitment, our Members have agreed to adopt the following set of passenger rights:
The right to disembark a docked ship if essential provisions such as food, water, restroom facilities and access to medical care cannot adequately be provided onboard, subject only to the Master’s concern for passenger safety and security and customs and immigration requirements of the port.
The right to a full refund for a trip that is canceled due to mechanical failures, or a partial refund for voyages that are terminated early due to those failures.
The right to have available on board ships operating beyond rivers or coastal waters full-time, professional emergency medical attention, as needed until shore side medical care becomes available.
The right to timely information updates as to any adjustments in the itinerary of the ship in the event of a mechanical failure or emergency, as well as timely updates of the status of efforts to address mechanical failures.
The right to a ship crew that is properly trained in emergency and evacuation procedures.
The right to an emergency power source in the case of a main generator failure.
The right to transportation to the ship’s scheduled port of disembarkation or the passenger’s home city in the event a cruise is terminated early due to mechanical failures.
The right to lodging if disembarkation and an overnight stay in an unscheduled port are required when a cruise is terminated early due to mechanical failures.
The right to have included on each cruise line’s website a toll-free phone line that can be used for questions or information concerning any aspect of shipboard operations.
The right to have this Cruise Line Passenger Bill of Rights published on each line’s website.
Yesterday, United Airlines revealed new uniforms. United crew walked the runway as part of their 25th anniversary celebration at Newark-Liberty’s Terminal C. The new United style rolls out on June 25.
“We are pleased to celebrate United’s long history at our Newark hub – a premier global gateway and a powerful economic engine,” said Jeff Smisek, United’s chairman, president and chief executive officer, in a press release. “We continue to make investments in our terminal facilities, our services and our people to ensure United’s Terminal C remains a great place for our customers and co-workers.”
Yesterday, travelers arriving and departing at Newark Liberty joined United employees in an anniversary celebration where customers had opportunities to earn prizes, travel discounts and bonus MileagePlus miles. The airline also had a temporary exhibit all about how air travel has evolved since 1988.
Good news for mountain bikers looking to hit a trail this long Memorial Day Weekend. The fabulous Mammoth Mountain Bike Park will open to riders this Saturday, kicking off another great summer season with a variety of trail options for riders of all skill levels.
Located in California‘s scenic Sierra Nevada range, Mammoth Mountain is a year-round outdoor playground for those who like to get away from it all. In the winter it offers some of the premiere skiing in all of North America and in the summer the bike park opens for a completely different type of fun. The park offers more than 80 miles of trail that includes cross-country, single-track routes with breathtaking views and adrenaline-inducing downhill courses for the more adventurous amongst us.
Mammoth Mountain’s trails offer gentle riding for beginners and more technical and leg-straining options for the experienced mountain biker. When the park opens on Saturday at least 12 of its trails will be ready for action. If you’re already familiar with what the park has to offer, the list of trails that will be open include: Downtown, UpTown, Big Ring, Paper Route, Juniper, Timber Ridge, Shotgun, Lower Pipeline, Lower Bullet Lakes Trail and Pioneer Practice Loop.
To celebrate the opening of the park for the summer, Mammoth is also offering an outstanding deal for this weekend. Just $69 will get you both lodging and a bike pass good for unlimited riding. You’ll have a hard time getting on this course for less cash than that anytime soon. What a great way to kick off the summer!