HIGH TECH TO GREET TRAVELLERS AT YYC

The new terminal at the Calgary International Airport to open Oct. 31 features new technologies and procedures designed to make the passenger experience faster and more enjoyable. Amanda Stephenson examines five features that will make it stand out.

SELF-SERVE OPTIONS

With the opening of the new terminal, travelling through Calgary International Airport will be more automated than ever. At check-in, passengers can use one of 20 self-bag drop units to check in and drop off their own bags.

If they are travelling to the U.S., passengers will have access to 25 automated passport control kiosks installed in the U.S. Customs and Border Protection pre-clearance area. The kiosks will eliminate the need for a paper customs declaration card, allowing passengers to scan their passports and answer a series of questions via machine. While travellers will still talk to a customs officer as part of the process, the time spent in front of that officer should be greatly reduced.

“It allows us to more efficiently expedite the legitimate travellers — the people who don’t need to go in for further processing,” said Raymond Purser, U.S. Customs and Border Protection port director.

Similar kiosks have also been installed for passengers arriving at Canada Customs. The automated machines will allow quick processing for low-risk travellers, speeding the flow of passengers and allowing customs officers to focus on enforcement instead of administrative work.

CATSA PLUS

The first full screening point of its kind in Canada, CATSA Plus — which will eventually be rolled out nationwide — is a collection of new airport security technologies and processes designed to improve the customer experience and reduce wait times.

The CATSA Plus line features four parallel “divestment areas” where passengers can unload their belongings into bins and prepare for screening. Allowing four passengers to undergo this process at once should make the lineups at security move faster, said Angus Watt, CEO of the Canadian Air Transport Security Authority.

“You won’t feel the same sense of urgency, and the slower passengers won’t impede the faster passengers from passing through,” Watt said.

Passengers will place their belongings in bins that move on a continuous conveyor belt, rather than one that starts and stops as per previous practice. When bags pass through the X-ray machine, images will be examined not by the security agent sitting in front of it, but by a team of agents watching on a multiplex screen in a remote location. All bags are tracked by electronic chips embedded in the bins, and if a bag needs to be examined by hand, it will be grabbed by an automatic diverter and removed from the conveyor belt.

The CATSA Plus line also features a larger “repack” area, complete with tables so that passengers can reassemble their belongings in a more comfortable, less pressured atmosphere.

YYC LINK PASSENGER SHUTTLE

The new terminal features a fleet of 20 electric passenger shuttle vehicles, each of which has seating for up to 10 passengers with their carry-on luggage and is wheelchair accessible.

The vehicles, custom-designed and built in Canada, run on a dedicated laneway, departing every two minutes and helping to transport passengers from one end of the terminal to the other.

The YYC Link passenger shuttles will be driven by customer care ambassadors, a new type of airport employee whose job is to meet and greet travellers.

“They will ask you about your day; they will point out the different things that are in each terminal; they will point out the cityscape and the mountain views,” said Debbie Stahl, director of passenger experience with the Calgary Airport Authority. “They’re really there to make people feel comfortable and confident in their connection process at YYC.”

BAGGAGE HANDLING

The energy-efficient Crisbag baggage handling system, manufactured by Danish company Crisplant, is the first of its kind in a North American airport. Rather than riding directly on a moving belt, each bag deposited in the system will be carried individually in its own tote over 10 kilometres of track and conveyors. The system can process more than 4,000 bags an hour and it will take bags less than 10 minutes to travel through the entire system. Every tote in the Crisbag system has an embedded chip that allows it to be tracked, making it far less likely that a bag will be lost or misplaced, airport officials say. “We know at every moment where every bag is in the entire complex,” said Calgary Airport Authority CEO Garth Atkinson.

SPEEDY CONNECTIONS

The entire international terminal at YYC was designed with ease of connections in mind. It is the first airport in Canada to feature a call-to-gate system, which means departing passengers will initially only know the concourse (A, B, etc.) they are departing from. Once in the central area of the departures hall, passengers will be able to watch on highly visible screens for confirmation of their gate assignments. The system is designed to make it easy for all passengers to enjoy the shops and restaurants in a central area, while being no more than a five-minute walk from their gates.

In addition, with the opening of the new terminal, the Calgary airport will be implementing the One Stop Security arrangement for passengers from Europe and the U.S. who are connecting through Calgary. Under this arrangement, passengers and their belongings who have been screened at their point of departure won’t have to collect their bags or go through security again in Calgary — they’ll simply have to clear customs and proceed to their connecting flights.

“We’ll have a special area for connecting passengers, so our customs process is going to be much faster for them,” said Ana Maria Coutu, acting district director for central Alberta, for the Canada Border Services Agency. “If you’re coming from Los Angeles on your way to London, you’ll have the ability to have just the one stop and go right up to your gate.”