Travel News

You might think that since the taxes that the FAA collects on airline tickets went dormant due to the FAA shutdown, travelers might be able to save a few dollars on their tickets. Unfortunately, you’d be wrong. As might be expected, most airlines quietly raised ticket prices to cover the missing taxes. And the result? Consumers pay the same prices for tickets, and airlines are making millions more per day.

How much, exactly? According to the New York Times, The taxes include a 7.5% levy on domestic tickets, $3.70 for each segment of the fight, and a $16.30 tax on international arrivals and departures. In the end, airlines are pocketing an extra $25 – $50 per ticket. Delta is making about $4-$5 million per day from the increased ticket prices, according to USA Today.

By and large the airlines are defending their actions, mostly. Jean Medina, a spokeswoman for the Air Transport Association, the airline industry trade group, said, “Basically, consumers are now paying the same as they did last week.” Glen Hauenstein, Delta’s Executive Vice President for Network Planning, Revenue Management and Marketing says “What the industry has done is simply to maintain prices at market-clearing levels.” What about American Airlines, once of the first airlines to raise their rates? “We adjusted prices so the bottom-line price of a ticket remains the same as it was before… expiration of federal excise taxes,” according to an American Airlines representative.

At least we can rest easy knowing that once the FAA budget gets approved, the rates will drop to make up for the taxes, right? Not so fast. According to the New York Times, “None of the airline industry experts I spoke to expected the airlines to roll back the new fare increases once the taxes are reauthorized.”

What can a traveler do? First, not all airlines raised their fees. Alaska Airlines, Spirit Airlines and a few others haven’t raised their fees. JetBlue did raise their fees at but is offering customers a refund (with a few catches), and now has eliminated the extra fees. We suggest flying through these and other airlines that haven’t raised their rates, and let the airlines that have raised their rates know how you feel! And keep an eye out for when the FAA is back in business – and watch those rates!

(Credit: KLAS-Las Vegas)

Roughly 50 showgirls from Jubilee, a Bally’s Las Vegas hotel and casino show, staged a protest march down the Las Vegas Strip on Thursday morning (July 21, 2011), protesting unadvertised resort fees in many of Las Vegas’ hotels. Fees can range from $4.99 to $24.99 per day, and cover the cost of newspapers, coffee, valet parking, and more, and are charged to room fees whether the services are used or not.

In the end, however, the protest was really just a marketing ploy by Caesar’s Entertainment. They have a no-fee policy, and the showgirls all for for the Caesar’s run Bally’s. The other big name entertainers at the protest included Marie Osmond, Donny Osmond, Penn and Teller, Jeff Timmons, and others, and they all work for Caesar’s Entertainment.

Regardless, it sure would be nice if resorts were upfront about resort fees. It’s frustrating to be surprised by a much higher than expected hotel stay, but unfortunately that happens almost everywhere. Cities love to stick it to travelers.

Video of the protest:

Imagining what it will be like to fly in 2050, Airbus is showing its vision for airplanes and a concept cabin for the future. Dubbed the “Vision for Aviation in 2050″, the aircraft manufacturer will be showing off its concept cabin to the public at the Paris Air Show next week.

Biometric Seats

Seats in 2050 will morph themselves to the body type of the person sitting in them, and will harness body heat to run holographic displays that will let the person play games or work.

Interactive Zone

Play virtual golf or other games in the “Interactive Zone”, one of the new was air travelers will be able to move about an interact.

Bionic Plane Structure

Future planes will have a more bionic structure mimicking bird bone structure. The new structure will be lighter and stronger, and will also have the ability to become transparent, giving fliers a chance for amazing views of the countryside and the night sky.

What the future holds for air travel is anyone’s guess at the point, and who knows which of the visionary items – if any – will be a part of air travel in 2050.

What do you do if you’re a Reuters photographer, you’re flying from Singapore to Jakarta with your family, and one of the engines explodes? Among other things, you take some pictures.

If the flaming engine out the window wasn’t scary enough, the lights went out and all the passengers endured a scary but thankfully successful emergency landing in Singapore.

Striking pictures, without a doubt. The captain praised the passengers for their calm, and no injuries were reported. Scary.

Read more at The Atlantic

This is the first in an ongoing news roundup feature that we’ll have every Friday here on Neotravel. We’ll post blurbs and links to noteworthy, interesting and funny travel news from around the world. If there are any tidbits that we missed, send us an email at info@neotravel.com, or post a comment on the roundup!

Bad news for those traveling with kids – American Airlines has instituted a new rule for strollers. If you are hoping to gate check a non-collapsible stroller that weighs more than 20 pounds, you’re out of luck. Will other airlines follow suit?

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/money_co/2011/05/revenue-from-airline-fees-nearly-double-since-2008.html

In an article about the relative speed of travel websites, I learned a few interesting tidbits, including that Marriott.com estimates that they lose $800,000 per hour that their website is down, and Delta estimates that one-third of their tickets are purchased online or through mobile devices. Both are pretty amazing.

http://www.usatoday.com/tech/news/2011-06-01-travel-websites_n.htm

Ah, so Groupon and Expedia are combining for travel flash deals. Dubbed Groupon Getaways, they will supposedly offer deals that are around 50% off retail rates for vacation packages, car rentals, airline tickets, cruises and activities. They are set to launch “soon”.

http://www.groupon.com/getaways

Hoping that airlines will reduce or eliminate passenger fees? Keep dreaming. Airlines collected over $21 billion (yes, billion) in from passenger fees and the sale of frequent flier miles in 2010, and these represent between 15% and 30% of all revenue.

http://newsfeed.time.com/2011/06/02/airlines-take-in-22-billion-from-add-on-fees-and-partnerships/

And in the lighter side of travel news, be careful when you lower your seat!

http://www.cnn.com/2011/TRAVEL/06/01/united.seat.recline.fight/index.html?iref=obnetwork

Please leave a comment if you think there’s anything we missed!

Have you ever wondered who the top Twitter users are in travel? We have, so we decided to rank them! We cataloged thousands of Twitter accounts, came up with our own algorithm to determine their relative strength, then pulled out the top 50 users. It was a ton of work, but really interesting!

If there are any accounts that you think deserve to be on the list, let us know! If you want your Twitter account ranked, let us know – and we’ll tell you what you rank is! And follow us (and give any comments) to us on Twitter at @neotravel.com!

See the Top Travel Twitter Users List!

From BuzzFeed, this mega list of 100 pictures taken out of airplane windows is amazing. Some of the pictures are professional quality masterpieces, but they all make me want to take a vacation. Right now.

See them all at BuzzFeed

Consumer Reports just released their ratings and rankings of hotels chains, polled from 27,506 subscribers. What did we learn? There are two important facts from the article: nearly half of all hotel rooms were empty in 2009, and overall guests paid about 9% less for their hotel room in 2009 than in 2008. Those are both amazing numbers.

As far as hotel rankings go, Ritz-Carlton topped the list in the “fanciest” category, Renaissance Hotels won the “luxury” category, and Homewood Suites topped the “upscale” category. The winner in the “moderate” category was Drury Inn & Suites, and the winner in “budget” was Microtel Inns & Suites. Who had bad ratings? Motel 6 and Days Inn had the worst scores in the entire survey for upkeep, service and comfort, and Travelodge, Econo Lodge and didn’t fare much better. That leads to the other takeaway from the article: while there is a big price difference between spending $40 at Days Inn versus $250 at the Ritz-Carlton, you also definitely get what you pay for!

View more details in the June 2010 issue of Consumer Reports, or at ConsumerReports.org.

A bullet train arrives at Nanjing Railway Station in Nanjing of Jiangsu Province, China. The nation's fastest train can run at a top speed of 250 kilometres per hour, according to state media. Photograph by AFP

The stories came out last week that China is willing to bankroll a super high-speed train line that will stretch from Beijing to London. The trains will be capable of running at more than 320 km/hour, and they hope the train line will be completed within the next year. Under the proposal, you can board in London and step off the train in Beijing, 8,100 kilometers away as the crow flies, in just two days. For comparison, flying time is about ten hours.

Personally, I love this idea, but I question the practicality a little bit. Most people that really need to get between London and Beijing are business travelers, and they will fly due to time constraints. If train tickets are significantly cheaper than air travel, that would make a difference. If you could make the trip for a few hundred dollars, they would get many more recreational travelers, I would think. Plus, if you could stop off for a day or two here or there, that would be nice. Taking a 10-hour train ride from London to Budapest, or other Eastern European locations would be a fun weekend getaway.

You can actually buy a Travelocity Gnome at Taylor Gifts, and I’m not really sure why. I guess it’s cute and a little bit funny, but seriously odd. Oh well, to each their own!

View at Taylor Gifts