Tag Archives: travel

How early should you get to the airport?

Nate Silver has put together a spreadsheet with a comprehensive answer to this question, based on records from 800 flights he personally has taken. You have to be a paid subscriber to his site to get the spreadsheet, but there are plenty of clues in the narrative. It is not crystal clear which factors are additive rather than overlapping.

  • First, the “base case” is a solo English-speaking American business traveler. Families and people who don’t speak perfect English are inconveniences that can be treated in a stochastic manner. More specifically, this base case is a solo domestic (U.S.) traveler, with TSA PreCheck or CLEAR, and not checking bags. For this base case, the rule is “60 minutes from walking through the airport door to departure.”
  • For a car commute, round up whatever Uber/Lyft says the trip will take by 30%. [For public transportation, my rule is to take the vehicle before the last vehicle that would get me there just barely on time.]
  • If parking or returning a rental car, add 15-30 minutes.
  • Add 15 minutes for a really big, busy airport (like JFK, O’Hare). 5-10 if you use that airport a lot and know it inside and out.
  • Add 5-10 minutes if you have a connection make. His reasoning: “This might seem silly since it doesn’t affect the departure time at the originating airport. But it raises the stakes for missing your flight. Also, if you arrive at the very last moment, you’ll likely be asked to gate-check your bag, which can get you off to a slower start when making that tight connection.”
  • Add 20 minutes if you do not have PreCheck/CLEAR, +5 for really big busy airports and -5 for small ones
  • Add another 20 minutes in bad weather.
  • For international, add 20-40 minutes if you don’t need to check in at the counter and another 15 (business class) to 30 (economy class) if you do.
  • Add 20 minutes if you just enjoy relaxing at the airport with a beverage before flying.
  • Special case: If you’re going somewhere (like Canada) that you need to clear immigration before getting on the plane, you need to allow an extra 30 minutes. Presumably it will save you the same amount at the other end (although in my personal experience, U.S. immigration is about as bad as it gets anywhere I have been.)

Okay, let’s try adding this up for my most common travel cases.

Case 1: A domestic business trip, let’s say I’m attending a 2-3 day conference. I have one bag that fits in the overhead compartment or can be gate-checked. I check in online. Weather is reasonable. I’m going to allow 60 minutes at the airport, +10 because my home airport of Philadelphia is pretty big and pretty busy but I know it well, +25 because I don’t have Precheck and security can be a real cluster-, +20 because I enjoy sitting down and having a beer before flying. That’s 1 hour 55 minutes, so the “2 hour rule” was just about right. I could do PreCheck if I really travel enough to make it worthwhile, and obviously I don’t need the beer, I just want it.

Case 2: An international trip with the family. I am past the stroller/car seat/diaper phase which would add exponential complication – not part of Nate Silver’s computational framework. Let’s say I am traveling in reasonable weather from the nightmare hell (but relatively easy to get to) hub of Newark. 60 minutes + 15 because it’s a nightmare hell hub + 10 minutes because there’s a connection + 20 minutes for security + 60 for counter check in (! – but yes, it can be this bad). I’ll skip that beer because I don’t want to get even more dehydrated on a long haul flight. I get 2 hours 40 minutes, so the “3 hour rule” is not far off.

So in conclusion, for me the 2 hour rule can maybe be shaved to 1.5 and the 3 hour rule to 2.5 if I want to live adventurously. I try to get to the airport by public transportation when I can though, so that adds another layer of likely delays. My rule there is to take the vehicle before the vehicle that would get me there just in time. Sometimes you just have to try to relax and make the most of wherever you happen to be, and not worry so much about the time. If I spent another half hour at home or the office before I left for the airport, what would I really do – either interact with other people or do something on a screen. Traveling is stressful, and it can be good to take a moment between the mad dash to the airport and security line, and the various inconveniences and indignities of actually flying. At the airport, I am more likely to read a book, have a beverage, or unwind a bit before flying if things aren’t too crazy.

the “digital nomad visa”

This article in Business Insider lists 29 countries that offer some kind of “digital nomad visa”. Be warned this is kind of a junky site with a lot of ads and links. Basically, you have to show that you have a job paying a certain minimum amount and you are allowed to work remotely, and you get a visa to stay often for up to a year depending on the country. There are clusters of countries in Eastern Europe, the Caribbean, Southeast Asia, and Central America making these offers. Other interesting ones include Spain, Portugal, Greece, Iceland, Japan, and UAE (Dubai). The countries have nothing much to lose if you think about it – this is an inflow of money from outside their borders, i.e. essentially an export just like tourism or full-pay international students. If you lose your job, they can kick you out if they want to, or give you a set period of time to find a new one. Singapore is not on this list, but they have a program along these lines as I recall. Not that normal people with normal jobs can afford to live there for any length of time.

Being independently wealthy would be even better of course, but this might be an option for young people, mid-life crisis people without crushing family responsibilities (do these exist?), or not-quite-retired people who still need or want to work.