The Worst Cities for Airport Connections

An airport connection (or two) is often the price you pay for service to far-off destinations. Unfortunately, a connection almost always complicates your travel planning, asking you to decide where to connect and how much time to allow for the connection. There’s no easy answer to those questions, but there are a 
few choice airports to avoid. You don’t always have the opportunity to choose where to connect, 
but when you do, three factors can determine which airports are riskiest:

Delays: Among the major U.S. airports, New York’s JFK, Newark, Chicago’s O’Hare, and San Francisco generally fare the worst in delay tabulations, which make them bad for an airport connection. Dallas-Fort Worth and Houston suffer more delays than you’d expect, given their benign weather locations. Conversely, snowy Salt Lake City and rainy Seattle generally do pretty well.
Connecting abroad? In Europe, Paris’s Charles De Gaulle, Frankfurt, and London’s Heathrow tend to top most delay lists. Most frequent travelers suggest connecting in Munich or Zurich when possible.

Airport Layout: The best hubs for an airport connection consist of large, single terminals, with all gates accessible through a single security point and inside-security (airside) for access between any two gates. Connecting is usually relatively easy this way, in that you need not go out of security and back in through another security checkpoint; your only worry is about getting from one gate to another. Among North American hubs, Atlanta, Denver, Miami, Portland, Salt Lake City, Toronto, and Vancouver are built this way. Overseas single-big-terminal hubs include Amsterdam, Frankfurt, Milan, Munich and Zurich.
Other big hubs, however, consist of separated terminal buildings you might need to navigate, including Chicago’s O’Hare, Dallas-Fort Worth, Houston’s Bush, Los Angeles, New York’s JFK, Newark, and San Francisco, plus London’s Heathrow and Paris’ De Gaulle overseas. You might be OK if your connecting flights are on the same airline, or otherwise use the same terminal. But if you have to change
terminals—and there’s no airside interterminal transport—you may have to exit security at your
incoming terminal, schlep to your outgoing terminal, and go through security again.
Try to avoid connections that require changing terminals.

Transit Areas: Most big connecting airports outside the U.S. allow you to remain in “transit” status, airside, on any connection. You still have to have your passport stamped, but you don’t have to do the double security thing. The U.S., however, does not offer transit status. Even if you’re connecting on the same airline in the same terminal, you could have to exit the secure zone to get your baggage, go through the immigration and customs rigmarole, and re-enter security.
But connecting at a foreign airport isn’t as easy as it once was, either: At many airports the U.S. now requires secondary screening for travelers heading here, even for in-transit passengers. Still, if you have a choice, it’s generally better to connect at a foreign rather than a U.S. airport.


At Villas of Italy while we don’t include air for our tours, we regularly help our guests in finding the best and most direct flights for the least possible cost when traveling to meet us for one of our tours.
 
Speaking of tours, we still have a few 'couples' spots (double occupancy) available for our 
Tuscan Adventure next August 18-28, 2019.

Once at the villa EVERYTHING is included; lodging in our Tuscan villa in a private double bedroom with a private bath, a beautiful pool overlooking vineyards, olive groves and nearby hill towns, unlimited beverages at the villa, all meals; gourmet meals while at the villa prepared by our villa chef, meals away from the villa at slow food movement restaurants, cooking classes at the villa by Chef Mauro of the Montese Cooking Experience, all tours, all wine, cheese and salumi tastings; EVERYTHING!
 
And, we will extend our special pricing for up to $1000 off per couple. Email us for a daily itinerary to see all the exciting things we will be doing over the 10-day adventure.

        We travel not to escape life, but for life not escape us