To visit La Guardia Airport is to wonder why anyone would want to give government more power over our lives.
La Guardia testifies to government dysfunction. Critical to the state’s economic health, you would expect the city and state governments to ensure La Guardia is operated efficiently. But nothing is further from the truth. Amid a renovation program in which few construction workers appear to actually be working, La Guardia is a disaster zone. Such was my experience traveling thru the airport last weekend. It was complete chaos with grossly inadequate directions and severe overcrowding.
The renovations are underway with little regard for the ramifications on effective traffic management, as sharing services are restricted to a crowded holding area. Talking to waiting riders in the pen, I learned that it can take up to an hour for an Uber or Lyft driver to actually reach the holding area. Why the airport has not designated a larger area for ridesharing cars beggars belief. It would even be preferable to operate a bus service to a larger pickup area off-site. The chaos only encourages ridesharing companies to break the rules and pick up in the areas for dropping off at departures.
Take what happened to me. Upon ordering a Lyft, I waited patiently at an arrivals pickup area. But after a few minutes the driver called to say that I should come to the departures area where he had just picked someone up. I explained that I was in the right area designated by La Guardia. He didn’t want to move. So I canceled the ride. Lyft then charged me for the cancellation, even though it was the driver’s fault for being in the wrong place. Making this point repeatedly to a Lyft customer service agent, I was eventually given the abrupt final reply: “No response needed — reiterated that the cancellation fee is valid as the ride was canceled within the ETA.”
Forget the rules, La Guardia is a dog-eat-dog world.
