"Pittsburgh Airport trying to expand security checkpoint"

Saturday, March 15, 2003

Airport trying to expand security checkpoint 
By Mark Belko
The Pittsburgh (PA) Post-Gazette


Pittsburgh International Airport travelers soon will have another lane
available to them at the security checkpoint and eventually will be able to
check their flight time on state-of-the-art monitors as they wait.

The Allegheny County Airport Authority board awarded a $39,995 contract
yesterday to begin the security checkpoint expansion and a $2.3 million
contract to install about 250 new flight information display monitors
throughout the terminal.

H.B. Reynolds Inc. won the contract to relocate glass partitions at each
side of the checkpoint. The move will enable the authority and the U.S.
Transportation Security Administration, which oversees security, to add an
eighth lane at the checkpoint to screen travelers.

Authority Executive Director Kent George said he hopes to have the expansion
completed in two to three weeks, in time for the spring and summer travel
seasons.

Lines to the checkpoint have increased recently, in part because of a
heightened terrorist alert that lasted two weeks and as college students
began heading south for spring break. At times, travelers have had to wait
almost an hour to clear the checkpoint.

International Display Systems Inc. of Dayton, Ohio, was awarded the $2.3
million contract to install the new 30-inch flight display monitors
throughout the landside and airside buildings. The smaller existing
monitors, which list arrival and departure information, no longer are made.
They have been in use since the terminal opened in 1992.

The existing system lists the arrivals and departures of US Airways, the
region's dominant carrier, separately from other airlines, which have their
own monitors. The new system, to be completed in a year, will list all
airlines together.

The airport authority also is considering the idea of using blank portions
of the screen to display advertising or even video clips of regional
attractions. There also may be a way to page travelers using a portion of
the screen. Those features initially will not be part of the new system.

"This will be the backbone to allow stuff like that to happen," authority
Chief Operating Officer Brad Penrod said.

In other matters yesterday, the authority reported a 20.8 percent drop in
traffic in January, compared against January 2002. The one million
passengers who came through the terminal in January was the lowest monthly
number since the terminal opened.

The monthly rate of decline was nearly as bad in November, when traffic was
down 20.7 percent over November 2001. The overall drop for 2002 over 2001
was 9.6 percent. The decrease continues a slide that started with the Sept.
11 attacks and deepened with the US Airways bankruptcy and economic
downturn.

Meanwhile, the Air Transport Association, which represents airlines, has
predicted that a war with Iraq could cause air traffic to drop 20 percent
overall.


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