Keep up on Thanksgiving airport traffic with Travelocity’s Task Force

by Grant Martin on

Nobody is looking forward to venturing into battle tomorrow. Wednesday is the year’s biggest travel day, a congested, high stress day when airports are packed, tempers are high and any small hiccup can make an entire airport turn upside down.

We all have to get home somehow though, and the harsh reality facing many of us is that the airport needs to be handled (my flight to London leaves from O’hare at 5PM).

Luckily, Travelocity already has street teams organized to help us manage the battle. This year, while they continue to quarterback part of the effort from their affable Window Seat Blog they’re also mobilizing the Twitter army to keep an eye on specific airports across the country. Each specific feed will dispatch updates from airport including delays, parking, security lines and general mayhem that’s going on around the terminal. It’s a great way to glean some insight into what to expect when you arrive — or watch the disaster from the comfort of your own home.

Each feed can be found on the Thanksgiving Task Force subpage. Tune in now and get your fighting pants ready for Wednesday — it’s going to be a big weekend.

Travelocity survey says: fat, smelly and coughing the worst to be sitting next to

by Scott Carmichael on

A Travelocity survey confirms what we knew all along – smelly passengers, coughing passengers and “passengers of size” are amongst the worst people to be sitting next to in the air.

The results are from the Travelocity 2009 “rudeness poll”, asking people a variety of questions. In total, the survey interviewed just under 1600 people, from the US and Canada. When the survey expanded on “large passengers”, 44% said the airlines should provide a second seat for free, while 39% said fat passengers should pay for their own space.

When asked about hotel items taken from the property, people either lied, or are just more honest than I expected – 13% of people never take anything from their room, and just 1% admitted to stealing dishes and silverware.

The survey is very well put together, and a lot of work was put into explaining the results. If you’d like to read more about rude passengers, check out the full version of the 2009 Travelocity Rudeness Poll (PDF file).

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Carnage report: Travelocity’s Roaming Gnome visits the Gadling Labs

by Grant Martin on

As our hangovers from this long holiday weekend begin to wane, more and more details from our time with Travelocity’s Roaming Gnome are coming forth.

It’s true, we got a little bit of flack from our peers when the little guy came out to visit the Gadling Labs, but our original hunch turned out to be true: irrespective of cross-promotional PR, live blogging, tweeting and hit sharing, people love to drink and take pictures with gnomes. That’s all there is to it, and that’s all we set out to do when we headed out this weekend. What a wild success.

To the best of our recollection, here’s how things unfolded:

Friday night: The gnome heads out in Ann Arbor, Michigan with Gadling’s Editor in Chief, Grant Martin on a bar crawl across the city, compelete with sangria, photo booths, skateboarders, shuffleboard, and no small share of whiskey.

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Saturday: The team barely makes it to Detroit Metro for a hop through Cincinnati into St. Louis, where Editor at Large Justin Glow is to be married. After an evening full or more gin than tonic with Gadling’s producer, Willy Volk, they turn in early for tomorrow’s activities.

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Sunday: Bound for New York City, the team flies from St. Louis to Newark and settles down on the Lower East Side of Manhattan where blogger Mike Barish has volunteered his digs. Into the city they careen, where the gnome meets a wide spectrum of personalities from the affable to the intoxicated to the downright creepy, with the crew finally ending up near Katz Deli at 4AM.

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Thanks to all who came out and had their photo taken, it was a once in a lifetime experience.

The Travelocity Gnome visits Gadling

by Grant Martin on

As the summer of 2009 winds to a close, Travelocity’s Roaming Gnome is wrapping up his tour of America. He’s been across the country, visiting Pat O’Brien’s in New Orleans, the beaches of San Diego and the narrow streets of Philadelphia, bringing joy, affection and gnominess to all those around him.

There’s only one stop left: The Gadling Labs.

This weekend, the 300 year old Travelocity Gnome will be joining us in a whirlwind tour of the Midwest and Northeast. Starting tonight in Ann Arbor, Michigan, we’ll be hosting a bar crawl throughout the sleepy college town, after which you might see us anywhere between Cincinnati, St. Louis, Newark, or New York as we plow through this Labor Day weekend head on.

If you happen to be in the Wolverine State this evening, stop by Dominick’s in Ann Arbor at 8PM to join in the festivites and get your picture taken with the gnome. Otherwise, keep an eye on the @gadling, or @RoamingGnome Twitter feeds to get updates on all of the action.

We’ll be posting your photos with the gnome on Gadling and on the Roaming Gnome’s Twitter and Facebook sites early next week, so make sure that you take this opportunity to grab your slice of fame!

Online bookings just got cheaper!

by Tom Johansmeyer on

Online travel deals just got better. Even though airlines are tacking on extra fees, fares have been plunging for a while now, so it still cuts in favor of travelers. Travel websites have started to get in on the savings, too. Several sites are ditching their booking fees – at least temporarily.

Orbitz, Travelocity and Expedia announced yesterday that they are waiving their booking fees. For Orbitz, this is a permanent move. In the hypercompetitive world of online travel sales, these guys are doing everything they can to get your travel dollars. So, if you’ve been waiting to save even more money on travel – as if the dirt-cheap fares aren’t enough – the deal just got a little better!

[Via BloggingStocks]