Board 8 > Newark Airport is a hellhole

(+) Yeah! (+)

I travel a lot for work and I swear this place is the worst airport in the country.

So far this week they have cancelled my first flight into Newark. Heavily delayed my rebooked flight. And now my return flight is somehow departing on time yet landing 4 hours late. Everyone loves landing at 4am...

It wouldn't be so bad if the terminals weren't so barren

why blame the airport for the airline's mess?
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Because the infrastructure inside the airport is terrible. It's incredibly dated and just outright inadequate for an airport as busy as this. The facilities inside the terminals are similar to the tiny regional airports when it obviously is not one.

I fly into Newark quite a lot. This is my 8th visit this year and it's always like this regardless of the airline I use. I also travel a lot so see a lot of other airports and they don't have the same delay issues as Newark nor the terrible facilities.

My only memory of flying into Newark was thinking, "Man, I should've flown into JFK instead."
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I've been to quite a few and it was definitely the worst.

Edit: I remember when I was there, they had an escalator that was out of order. And contra Mitch Hedberg, they did not allow it to become stairs. There was a security guard standing there forcing everyone to go way around and take some super crowded elevator than simply climb up the non functional escalator.
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Next time I come I'm honestly considering just flying into Philly or something and driving the extra distance

I usually don't mind sitting in airports except for this one

You can't do JFK?
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I could but JFK is about the same distance from my end destination as Philly. As is Allentown. Trenton is a bit closer but I think that's a lot more limited in flight selection.

Orlando is small enough that LGA should be in striking distance too, yeah? It's not as nice as JFK but a little nearer to NJ and it ain't Newark.

JFK can suck too.
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LGA is about an hour away from where I need to be when I travel up here so yeah it's an option too

dude I did a ton of travelling for work and Newark really isn't bad

like yeah it's not great

but it's not awful

I guess in comparison to smaller airports it sucks but when it's that busy there's only so much you can do
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It's a big airport that does not have the facilities of a big airport unless you are in the international terminal. The delays wouldn't be bad if the facilities weren't terrible.

And it being busy isn't an excuse. I fly into plenty of other big airports without these issues.

Just googled it. Newark is ranked the second worst airport in the country behind LGA.

Philly, Chicago and Boston make the rest of the bottom 5.

ShatteredElysium posted...

Just googled it. Newark is ranked the second worst airport in the country behind LGA.

Philly, Chicago and Boston make the rest of the bottom 5.

Honestly, these just sound like cities with people who love to bitch.
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It says the rankings are based on the following factors

on-time arrival rates, security delays, customer experience score, reader reviews and amenities such as shops and restaurants

ShatteredElysium posted...

customer experience score, reader reviews

just sayin...!
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I didn't think it was so bad, but then I just went to a bar and got really really drunk
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SeabassDebeste posted...

ShatteredElysium posted...

Just googled it. Newark is ranked the second worst airport in the country behind LGA.

Philly, Chicago and Boston make the rest of the bottom 5.

Honestly, these just sound like cities with people who love to bitch.

I fly a bunch and agree that Chicago and Newark suck. Havent had much trouble with Boston but obviously never connected through there
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ShatteredElysium posted...

Just googled it. Newark is ranked the second worst airport in the country behind LGA.

I don't know how that's possible. LGA has been good to me, while EWR was just an awful experience. JFK beats both but it's also farther from Manhattan, which sucks for me when I leave my company's NYC office to catch a flight home.
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I missed a connecting flight in New Jersey on my way to England right before the 2006 World Cup....can't remember if it was Newark or Trenton. Got a flight to an Atlanta airport (with Jackson in the name, I think), slept there for the night, then went to England the next day.

So yes, I would say Newark airport is definitely bad.
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My flight was supposed to be at 9pm. It is now estimated to depart at 330am. But the current pattern has been every time an hour passes, it gets delayed again by another hour.

Apparently the plane we were supposed to get on was directed to Baltimore so I don't know how they are going to keep even that 330am timeslot

That sucks. After sleeping in 3 different airports in 3 weeks in Brazil, i am content to keep my air travel to a minimum.
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And now delayed until 455am. Beyond a joke

XIII_rocks posted...

I didn't think it was so bad, but then I just went to a bar and got really really drunk

This man knows how to fly
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And after 8 hours of waiting they cancel the flight and then tell us all that all the flights out of this airport are fully booked today so they can't even transfer us to one of them

Wow wtf that is awful. You're trying to get back to Florida now? Do they just expect you to hang out there all weekend?

They should at least get you a taxi to Trenton or JFK for an outgoing flight from there or something.
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They got me a flight out of Westchester at 2pm today. So now I just have to pay $100-150 in an uber to get there. So from leaving the office in Jersey to getting to my house is going to be a 25 hour trip. I could have drove home quicker

And I do have to pay it out of pocket since the airline won't reimburse when it's due to weather (which is bs as other flights were coming in and out during the delay)

They don't even cover the replacement flight?? wtf. I've had some rough airport/flight experiences but this is worse than any of them.
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I don't have to pay any fees to get the replacement flight. What I'm out of pocket for is that the replacement flight is at a different t airport and my only means of getting there is Uber which is going to be like $150. And they won't reimburse the uber fare

And now just the 8 hour wait for my flight in Westchester. Boy this is a tiny airport but it seems decent. Time to find a corner to sleep in!

Uber was $132 for the record

ShatteredElysium posted...

And now just the 8 hour wait for my flight in Westchester. Boy this is a tiny airport but it seems decent. Time to find a corner to sleep in!

Uber was $132 for the record

This is the kind of thing that could be covered if you had a credit card with a trip delay or travel interruption perk. Of course, those credit cards tend to be the ones with high annual fees, so if you don't travel much, they're probably not worth it to you.
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The company will reimburse me for it but I still feel the airline should have done so.

Weather happens and that's the reason they will use so they don't have to compensate but I strongly suspect this wasn't due to weather just because of how it went down. I also suspect they knew it would be cancelled hours before they told us.

Other flights were going in and out during the weather delay and the departure board was sketchy about our flight. Like the app would say we were due to land X amount of hours late but the departure board showed no delays and even at like 11pm it was showing a 9pm departure time yet a way later arrival time on both the departure board and app. At one point it even disappeared entirely from the departure board for multiple hours but still displayed on the app. And we only got sporadic updates over the tannoy. I think they knew before midnight it was getting canceled but didn't tell us as they knew next flights out weren't until the next day

Also an airline employee flat out told the crowd of people that were waiting that we were being lied to. And this was prior to the cancellation being announced

I searched for 'Worst US Airports' and the top few links I clicked all seemed to say the same thing. Even if they had said the opposite to what I thought about Newark I'd have posted what I found. I didn't actually know what would be on the list when I searched. These are the ones I clicked

https://www.businessinsider.com/worst-airports-america-2017-6

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-12-15/these-are-the-worst-airports-in-america

I certainly didn't try to just find whatever supported my view

Yeah I read more of the topic after I posted and saw the methodology which is why I deleted my post. I thought you were talking about things in the terminals to keep you occupied mainly. Sorry to hear about your experience.
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two of my friends recently missed a wedding trying to fly out if newark. flights straight up canceled. separate flights on different airlines too, to the same location... spread out over like 20 hours
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Yeah I mean I am at least just going home so im not missing anything other than my free time which sucks but it's certainly not as bad as some people who were on the same flight as me. Saw so many people upset because it meant they would miss cruises or weddings or family meetups etc.

Felt bad for them which is why I didn't kick up a fuss and just took whatever rebooking they gave me. I know there were other people who needed to be there sooner than me. The flight I'm getting is the 3rd of the day to Orlando from Westchester, I could have got the 630am or 1030am one if I had dug my feet in I think.

20 hours later, finally sat on a plane about to head home. Hooray!

JetBlue also issued me with $350 in flight credits after I sent them a strongly worded email complaint (I had a lot of time to kill!)

Nice work. That's a decent deal too
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