A Crowd-Free Day at Regional Airports

No daunting lines greeted passengers Monday at Southern California’s regional airports. Traffic did not raise blood pressure. Parking was plentiful.

The experience was very different from that at Los Angeles International Airport, where lengthy waits and other headaches nagged passengers trying to fly for the first time since last week’s terrorist attacks.

West Hollywood resident Elaine Curtis, 31, was waiting at a Burbank Airport terminal for a flight to Texas. “Did you see the parking lot?” she asked. “There’s nobody here.”

Airport and airline officials attributed the uncrowded terminals to the reduced number of flights and fewer passengers for routes that were in service.

At Burbank, planes that used to be packed were half empty, spokesman Victor Gill said. The airport also experienced a cut in flights Monday, from the usual 160 arrivals and departures to 134.

Similarly, flights were down at John Wayne Airport in Orange County, with 200 takeoffs and landings compared with the usual 250.

Around noon Monday, no one waited at the airport’s ticket counters in the main terminal. Bag inspections were brisk.

“As you can see, it’s all empty,” said Corinne Leister, a retiree who volunteers at John Wayne Airport every Monday, helping passengers with directions. “It’s quiet. And when a plane does land, there’s not a planeload of people.”

Regional airport officials thought travel would be busier Monday because fewer hurdles exist for many passengers who--unlike those at LAX--can still be dropped off directly in front of terminals and park in the closest lots. But there was no noticeable spillover from LAX.

“It’s difficult to speculate,” said Maria Tesoro, a spokeswoman for the Ontario airport. “We don’t know if passengers are coming from LAX.”

Ontario passengers said they appreciated their hassle-free experience. Many said they also felt safer.

“I’m going to think twice about flying out of LAX now,” said Peggy Reyes, an Indio resident who returned Monday from Midway Airport in Chicago.

“The terrorists . . . are not going to come out here like they would LAX,” Reyes said.

At the normally sleepy Long Beach field, things were even quieter than usual Monday. Taxis were no longer allowed to wait in front of the terminal because of security concerns. Instead, cabbies were told to park just outside airport grounds and were radioed when needed.

Fabian Garcia, 19, a medical equipment technician from Dallas, was saying goodbye Monday to relatives and friends he had been visiting.

“It looks the same as it did when I came in,” Garcia said, sitting in a shady section between the baggage claim and the main terminal. “The only thing difference is that there aren’t any taxis over there.”

*

Times staff writers Zanto Peabody, Nancy Wride and Buck Wargo contributed to this report.