I’ve posted a shot of this gate before. It’s at the midpoint of Detroit’s McNamara Terminal: the main security checkpoint, where the train boards, where the tunnel leads to another terminal, where walkways begin. Where all the action is. So Delta makes a bit of a show here.
I don’t know when they disappeared, exactly. I suppose it’s been a few years. But from my earliest memories of flying, a clear standout wasn’t the sharp acceleration of takeoff, the strangely clogged and popping ears, or emerging into a gleaming orange sunset after climbing above dense clouds. It came via the speaker system.
In the gate area as an Asia-bound airplane prepares for departure.
Whether on a layover or at an end of a trip, DTW’s Terminal A was the place. It had been years since I’d used another terminal, and far longer since I’d transited between them. When I first started my overseas trips in 2000, Detroit Metro Airport was one of the least modern in the country, the capacity of its 1960s-era technisqualor buildings long outstripped by passenger traffic. Then came the bulldozers and cranes. Now the terminals are linked by this tunnel that features a light show synchronized to the music. It’s a half mile psychedelic trip more akin to a tropical fish tank than a tube beneath the tarmac. But Detroit isn’t short on contrasts.
The McNamara Terminal and its mini train at Detroit Metro Airport.
The empty gate area at A66, about 9:30pm.
Walking just the distance of a few gates in Detroit’s McNamara Terminal, our global connectivity laid bare. Cleveland, Seoul, Amsterdam, Sault Sainte Marie. A few steps but a window to the world. It never stops seeming cool to me. And as a global health practitioner, in the coolness are challenges.