Mexico City Airport review by A Johnson

22 May 2008   Customer Rating :

Some parts of this airport are bright and modern while other parts are cramped and dingy. Landside of Terminal 1 is a long, two-story corridor with money exchange desks, car rental agencies, and shops. Check-in desks for domestic flights are located in small alcoves along the ground floor of the corridor, which can be hard to find if you don't know what you're looking for. International check-in is on upper floor. There are some high-end boutiques airside along with the usual duty-free stores. On departure to USA, there was a manual inspection of hand luggage at the gate to ensure compliance with liquids rules. On arrival, there was a 15 min wait for passport control at 9PM. After you claim luggage, you must send it through an x-ray, then press a button which displays either a red light (manual inspection) or green light (free to leave). Unlike most airports, money change rates are competitive -- poke around to find the best deals. Airport is served by the metro, but the entrance is hard to find (walk to south end of terminal, then down sidewalk along access road.)

Mexico City Airport review by H Dang

10 March 2008   Customer Rating :

Arrived in the new domestics Terminal used by Skyteam airlines enroute Puerto Vallarta to Leon/BJX. Modern and clean and security quite efficient. Workers spoke some English which was great for our very little Spanish. Interesting shops. The downside is that though the terminal is modern and airy, it almost has a cold feeling to it. I guess this is common at Mexico City Airport, you don't know the gate until 15 minutes before boarding, we had to keep asking Aeromexico staff where our gate was. You must watch your bags diligently as when I was occupied with my iPod, a man walked up to our carry-on and then walked away when I looked up. This happened twice.

Mexico City Airport review by R Yevcak

19 January 2007   Customer Rating : n/a

Unfortunately this airport is always at maximum capacity, and even with the additional terminal for international flights [only serviced by SkyTeam members, though] it will not be enough. Much modification has been made, though, and the airport is state-of -the art. Plasma screens await you at check in, and different halls allow easier check in, and make the process quieter, and faster. All the new duty free shop's are amazing, along with all of the restaurants. I wish American airports had those choices. Unfortunately immigration is pretty bad in the evening, and during peak travel times. Try to avoid 6-8pm, or early morning as this is when flocks of large flights from Europe, South America, and North America arrive. Even with the 3 different immigration stations, over 2000 people were in line with me at one time. Surprisingly I only waited an hour.

Mexico City Airport review by Henry Lew

7 November 2006

Two warnings: Your boarding pass may list a gate or puerta, but puerta may refer to the entry area for security check. The exit doors to the street also have puerta numbers. Your actual boarding gate must be found on departure screens which only show the next hour or two. After passing thru security, travellers have been pickpocketed in the waiting lounges.

Mexico City Airport review by Joel Chusid

12 April 2006

This airport had an amazing array of restaurants, stores, banks, and other services. Four Starbucks, a Gloria Estefan Cuban restaurant, every fast food chain you can imagine, and some unique stores like the Museum of Anthropology and the government map store. The queues were short, and things were well organized. Even taking a taxi was easy. The major negative was the elongated design, which resulted in a lot of walking, but you could chalk that up as a positive if you want to get some exercise!

Mexico City Airport by Alexander Williams

29 June 2005

Mexico City's Airport is way better than what I expected, since I had never been there before. The new migration areas (M2, and M3), are really effective, specially when arriving in a Sky Team member airline (special area). The airport is clean, but it should have some internal transportation system, because when arriving at concourse A, to catch an international flight for example, you'll have to walk miles before getting there. I've seen the "Terminal dos" project and it seems to be really nice, and hopefully effective, because traffic is increasing day by day. I imagined some airport as Bogota's or Sao Paulo's, but Mexico City International Airport has a much better infrastructure.

Mexico City Airport by Jose Baldarra

21 March 2005

Mexico City is a huge massive international airport, and it has been under major construction, actually, some new areas as the new concourses F1 and F2 have been inagurated, and a new international baggage claim and migration area is taking place near the concourse G, (gates G29-36). Even tough, its still not enough, you'll always find looong queues and meanwhile the monorail stars operations, you'll have to keep walking hours and hours to find your boarding gate, or the baggage claim areas. MEX's terminal 2 is quite nice, very clean, and small, its a shame that its only used by Aeromar. By late 2005, MEX will almost cover the demand it generates, terminal 1 will be totally expanded, terminal 2 will be demolished, and a new one will be built instead, and terminal 3 will be a small (10 gate) terminal, with service of Aeromar, AeroLitoral (AeroMexico Express), the new Mexicana Click, and some others.

Mexico City Airport review by Al Westby

4 December 2004

The airport is huge, specially because (as Jose Krieger stated) its a linear building. The terminal (both domestic and international terminals are united) is a VERY long building (a couple of miles long) with many shops on one side and check-in counters on the other. Going from one end of the airport to the other can easily take you around 30 minutes or so. There´s a new check-in area for the international terminal under construction, where the new international arrivals will also be located. I have see this this place and it will be spacious and quite state-of-the-art. (this area will be opened by next year). Also, the new AeroMexico hub will be build at the opossite side of the runways (a 21 gate terminal, in addition to the current 36 gates, and will be linked to the main building by a skytrain). Right now the airport is quite crowded but the new construction may change the whole perspective of the place. In addition, there are two 5 star hotels inside the terminal (Hilton and Camino Real), many duty free shops, restaurants, coffe places (a couple of Starbucks and others), traditional stores and airline lounges. There are many information kiosks and very helpul people. Great place, crowded but nice.

Mexico City Airport review by Alan McKee

8 September 2004

Everything Jose Krieger writes above is true. However, over the past few months great improvements have been made in check-in times which are down from queuing for 2 hours to about 30 minutes. Arriving though, is worse - expect to spend at least 2 hours from disembarkation to exiting the airport.

Mexico City Airport review by Jose Krieger

22 January 2004

Mexico City Benito Juarez International Airport is a classic case of an aiport that has grown, and grown, without any particular design other than the geography of its location. In the 1940's, the airport was reasonable, and in the 1950's it was still manageable. Since then, it has grown linearly, so often boarding involves lengthy walks - or sometimes "kneeling" buses- with poor signage (other than the many shops trying to part you from your money). This linearity extends to the check-in counters, some of which are hidden in nooks and crannies and again are poorly singed. Departure involves changing floors and arbitrary, variable security procedures, sometimes surly staff, and a decent possibility of getting lost due to poor signage throughout. Departure security still includes (non-)"random" checking of hand items at the gate - generally meaning those standing closest, like elite and first clkass passengers, are grabbed and searched. Arrivals are possibly even worse - non-existant signage, arbitrary and continually changing queues, and often late-arriving luggage arriving at poorly marked carousels. Entry into the arrivals hall means a descent into chaos, with mobs of people awaiting friends and family, official and unofficial touts and baggage carriers competing for your attention, pirate taxi cab drivers (which can actually lead you to an assault) and more lousy signage. (If you need transport, seek the kiosk that sell you bus tickets or a ticket for a licensed, legal taxi.) If you are changing flights in MEX, you must often pass through immigration and customs for inspection - though smuggling here is inordinately easy, as arriving and departing passengers mix in the busy, long corridors leading to the airplane gates. A new airport planned for the Lake Texcoco lakebed was stopped by massive protests of people who live in that area, so there is no respite predicted in the next decade or two, only further airport growth and more chaos. If you are not MEX-bound and can schedule a direct flight to your destination, do so. You will be glad you did.

Mexico City Airport review by Anthony Saunders

28 December 2003

Mexico City International Airport is doing a great deal of improvement but it is still far from accomplishing the requirements for the city it serves just because it is a very small airport.






 

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