For our stay-over visitors, the airport is the first and last impression they have of Grand Cayman, and, for years now, neither of those impressions has been positive. Excluding the live island music arriving passengers might hear outside the immigration hall, the welcome isn’t pleasant, with long lines, suspicious customs officers and, should they need to visit a restroom after their long flight, a bathroom experience that borders on Third World.
Departing passengers face an even worse prospect, especially if they leave on Saturday or other times when the airport is particularly busy. After waiting in long security screening lines that often snake outside into the hot sun, travelers are faced with a departure lounge that has a seating capacity of 161 fewer than the 556-person occupancy. On busy days, dozens of people are left to stand, or sit, or lie on the floor while they wait to board their plane.
As one of our readers, Ralph Henderson, pointed out in a letter to the editor last week, such treatment is especially hard on elderly passengers and may have played a role in the sudden death of his 80-year-old wife minutes after she deplaned in Toronto.
This is an entirely unacceptable way to treat Grand Cayman’s residents, let alone its guests, particularly if we’d like them to return one day. Having an airport in the condition of Owen Roberts International is like hosting a dinner party at one’s home with a severely warped table, not enough chairs, and chipped glasses.
Grand Cayman positions itself as a safe and sophisticated tourism destination, and these are large reasons why people are willing to pay a premium to vacation here. However, our tourism product of late is under-delivering on the value-for-money proposition, given issues such as our noxious landfill, a congested downtown and Stingray City, roving packs of snarly canines and a steadily increasing issue with crime.
The Airports Authority realizes the planned expansion of the departure lounge is not the ideal solution, but Grand Cayman cannot wait any longer to mitigate a problem the government has been aware of for more than a decade now. Some may look at the estimated cost of $210,000 as an unnecessary expenditure, given the plans for the major airport renovation project, but Cayman can ill-afford to continue alienating its visitors with an airport experience that is uncomfortable at best and potentially dangerous at worst.
The Airports Authority claims safety and security are a top priority, but it concedes that it doesn’t actually count the number of people in the departure lounge at any given time. Its “belief,” therefore, that its maximum capacity is not exceeded even on the busiest of days appears to be nothing more than conjecture or wishful thinking. If the shoulder-to-shoulder crowds in the departure lounge do not constitute a violation of Cayman’s fire and safety regulations, then there’s something wrong with those regulations.
Still, we welcome the news that something is being done to address the miserable conditions at the airport. However, we remain cognizant that the temporary departure lounge extension is only a Band-Aid solution to a problem that everyone knows has existed for years and five successive government administrations have chosen to do nothing about.
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Great article! Cayman needs to immediately address the arrival and departure procedures at the airport. Custom officials need better training/computers to be able to scan and stamp passports quicker and move the lines along. Security needs more staff and more lines(without people skipping ahead on separate lines when their flights are being called) when they know many planes will be taking off and landing(Saturdays). Its absolutely ridiculous at times.
I am glad to see something being done, although I know it won’t be in place for my next trip through the airport in a few weeks. I don’t think it needs hundreds of millions of dollars of upgrade to become a joyful experience to visitors, just some strategically place improvement could make all the difference. Thing as simple as having all the customs lines open fancier bathrooms and better eating facilities would have a huge positive impact on the overall experience.
I think problems such as this are a direct result of how the Caymanian people including the CIG view visitors to the island. In the years I’ve spent getting to know Cayman the one thing I find obvious that I don’t experience on other islands is that the Caymanian people generally think of visitor as an unnecessary nuisance, that they are the lucky one’s to be able to visit the island. For the most part I get the impression that most Caymanians feel that they are doing visitors a favor by allowing them to step foot on their island paradise. This attitude likely filter through to those in charge. While on a Zip Lining tour through the tropical rain forests of St Lucia, a beautiful young tour guide made a comment at the end of the tour that I will never forget. She thanked us for coming and told us that they appreciated us visiting their beautiful island and that tourists like ourselves were their bread and butter. Nearly 10 years later I still remember her name ‘KiKi’ because of the impression she left on us. She was so proud of her home and happy to show it to visitors. This is the type of thing that makes people want to come back. In over a decade of traveling through Owen Roberts, I can’t remember ever seeing a smile on any Airport Employees face. I do remember being nearly interrogated on several occasions as to why I was back so many times as if I was doing something wrong or taking something away from them by visiting so much. I would think that someone who regularly visits and invests locally would be appreciated. Don’t get me wrong I have plenty of Caymanian friends some born Caymanian and some who have settled or regularly visit there. But there is a growing cancer in Cayman of hatred for ones fellow man that is spreading rapidly which has the potential to ruin the overall peaceful and loving climate that Cayman has enjoyed for decades.
Change back to the human money collectors for airport parking. Have friendly people working there who will carry out their duties with a smile.
The mechanical system is cold and impersonal which starts the trip off on the wrong foot.
The person collecting money can express Caymankind in real life as I agree with the comments made by Michael Davis.
Cayman has always reminded me of a gifted child that wasted its God given talents due to laziness. Cayman has it all in the palm of its hand. Cayman could be so much more if it ever had leadership that had the ability to inspire and motivate the people. Sadly history has proven over and over that such leadership is rare if not extinct. The people have thrown their trust in such individuals over the years only to be sold out and robbed of their tax dollars. So I can see why the people are not inspired to help the tourist. When I look at the people of Cayman its easy to see the years of distrust that the Cayman government has breed into them. It’s bad in the states too but Cayman has a more concentrated condensed version of it on the island. The Cayman Island song should be: Waiting on the world to change.