Originally Posted by
OzzyOzBorn
And on top of the financial considerations, USPC requires an airside pier to be sterilised for its exclusive use. That is a significant blow to flexibility at an already space-restricted facility. If MAN does eventually go for USPC, I won't be complaining about it, though I really feel that there is no longer a compelling case for it, all variables considered. Immigration technology has moved on at pace and we must expect that trend to continue.
I don't think DUB's arrangement has an airside pier sterilised for USPC exclusive use. The facility there uses the lower level of the pier serving the 400 series gates, with non-USPC flights served from gates from the upper level of that pier. So the pier overall serves a mix of USPC and non-USPC destinations.
In any event because, as you say, we must expect the trend in immigration technology to continue to move on at pace, the proposal at EDI envisages the use of facial recognition technology to allow USPC passengers to continue to access the entire terminal space. I'm not sure how that would work given that you'd be mixing passengers security screened to two different standards (US and UK) but time will tell.