Passenger Segregation - Arrival/Departure

[strontium.dog74]

Guys, ok so is there a reason why passengers are segregated at airports for arrivals and departures? Is it a recommendation or requirement by ICAO/FAA? Are there any international airports that do not segregate their arrival and departure passengers on the airside waiting areas?

Thanks

[perkin]

At AMS, all arrivals and departures intermingle happily...security checks are carried out at the departure gate. ID & a boarding card are required to access the departure lounges, although they are not 'sterile' areas. I presume Schiphol do not separate arriving and departing pax to make life easier for the huge numbers of transfer passengers at that airport (I think 40%+ of total pax numbers).

The only separation is those passengers going to Schengen destinations, and those going to all other destinations.

[deltayankee]

Good question! I can confirm the comment about AMS. I am there right now and the comers and goers mix promiscuously and apparently without any fear. This is dramatically different from Paris CDG where the incoming pax are very carefully routed through strange passageways and even over home made stairs to avoid any danger of meeting the others before they are dumped almost on the street. (And yes, if you have a short connection you have to line up for security again!).

If it is so dangerous to mix the two types of passengers why is there so little trouble at AMS? At ARN, too, incoming pax just walk through the "departure" area and I have never heard of any trouble.

[Cyrano]

I suppose there are two reasons for segregating arriving and departing streams: security and immigration. (You could count access to duty-free as a third, but since modern airports are mostly shopping malls where some of the exits happen to be blocked by metal tubes with wings, I don't think restricting duty-free access is a key issue :cool: ).

From the security point of view, if you don't segregate arriving and departing passengers airside, then your airport's security is only as good as the security of the worst airport you serve. This probably explains the AMS design: because they have security checks at the individual gates, the mixture of arriving and departing passengers doesn't pose a security risk. I guess there are essentially three zones:
1. Landside
2. Airside (have to show passport/ticket)
3. Secure (in AMS, the gate areas)
If you don't isolate the gates and screen them individually, then the "secure" perimeter has to be wider, essentially covering both no. 2 and no. 3 above (and thus you have to segregate passengers).

From the point of view of immigration, you obviously still need to segregate e.g. Schengen and non-Schengen passengers (as AMS does).

Dublin airport always struck me as one of the worst examples of non-segregation (only slightly better now since Pier D opened). Not only were arriving and departing passengers in Pier A and the old Pier D all milling around together, and not only are domestic, Common Travel Area and full international passengers all arriving into the same area, but if you'd done online check-in, it seemed to me you could arrive into (say) the old Pier D on an international flight and then get straight onto a domestic flight, with neither security nor immigration ever getting a look at you.

C.

[strontium.dog74]

... yeah I understand why.. for an added reason there is also the issue of efficiency of seperation. I have looked in a number of texts and they discuss the reasons for seperation but none state if it is a requirement by ICAO, CAA, FAA etc. I am assuming not then if airports aren't doing it, always handy to knw which ones aren't so I can reference that in my report as a justification if necessary.

Thanks

[groundhand]

Segregation is determined by the country and not aviation. In the UK the DfT publish the requirements, the airport companies (not the airlines) have to provide the facilities and controls to meet the requirements. There is no international standard nor requirement in this respect.

[strontium.dog74]

I'll have a look at DfT site and see if I can find the document that relates.

[deltayankee]

Actually on the Schengen side of AMS there is no gate security. I guess that this is because there is a Europe wide standard for security so all incoming pax are presumed clean.

From what I have seen recently it looks like a national preference. In France, Italy and Germany strong segregation is the norm, while in Sweden, Denmark and Holland they prefer mixing.

[perkin]

Schengen side of AMS has security after passport control. I think arrivals proceed through the non-Schengen area, although I've not been through the Schengen are, so not entirely sure...

[OzExpat]

I don't know about AMS but, at SIN, arriving and departing passengers mix in a very large common area. The difference here is that departing pax are screened the departure gate and arriving pax go through a generally easier check after leaving the Immigration checkpoint, but before leaving the terminal.

[TotalBeginner]

In the UK, departing passengers who have completed the security process are segregated from all international arrivals. This ensures that departing passengers can only be in contact with other passengers that have undergone the same UK security procedure (i.e. domestic arriving passengers).

[NorthRider]

In HEL we only separate shengen/non-shengen. Domestic/international are not separated. Pax arriving on flights from within the EU are not security screened, where as non EU are put through security first and then released to freely mingle with the rest. Control on sale of tax free is done via checking of the bording cards.
The system works pretty well, the only problem is that we have different baggage claims lobbys for dom/int/non-shengen... Pax often end up in the worng on by mistake.

[Ibis]

The British Airports Authority (BAA), which operates Heathrow, claims the profiling is needed because the new terminal will have a single departure lounge for domestic and international travellers."

http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=D8UHU99G0&show_article=1


One can see the big bucks :ugh:

[Peter47]

The main reason, I suppose is security - to prevent arriving passengers handing a bomb / gun etc to a departing passenger. At AMS departing and arriving passengers are still segregated past security - its just that security is after the common holding area. It saves transferring passengers having to walk miles to a rescreening point.

You know all this. However, this assumes that security at the originating point of the inbound flight was not up to scratch. In the U.S. domestic passengers do not require rescreening when interchanging (think of the logistics if they did). However international passengers do even if only transiting areas past security to exit - as you will know if you have arrived at ATL or MCO. I think its known as the ' Not Invented Here' syndrome.

I read somewhere that many European airports were expecting benefits from being able to asume that arrivals from most countries would be 'sterile' and therefore wouldn't require rescreening. It seems that all international arrivals at UK airports will continue to require rescreening. Could someone confirm the above?

If true wouldn't it be sensible if countries couldn't audit each other are providing adequate security so that arrivals from only a few countries had to be segregated. Or is the 'NIH' syndrome alive and well?

[Peter47]

AMS have now centralised their security. Arriving into AMS from LHR last weekend we exited directly into the sterile area. The same was the case arriving into ZRH from LCY last year. Presumably this is because we had been through security at LHR which has passed an ICAO (?) audit. The same would certainly not happen in the US or probably the UK where rescreening would be necessary. Is this because the Dutch (and Swiss) authorities are happy to accept other's security checks and the US & UK don't trust others?

[172_driver]

PMI and MAD are two airports I can think of (I believe BCN too) where arriving and departing passengers meet. There is no gate security point.

[RedhillPhil]

We had to - and they still do - separate arriving and departing passengers for Eurostar at both Waterloo and St. Pancras. Late arriving trains could cause some nifty re-platforming at times sometimes having to hold a train outside whilst one at the only adjacent empty platform was boarding.

[ZFT]

Not that uncommon to mingle. SIN and KUL spring to mind.