Salt Lake City Airport

Very inconsiderate to remove all the smoking areas inside the gate areas. It is upsetting to see another airport (SLC) not allow passengers to relieve a little stress and having a cigarette between flights. I will avoid SLC in the future. Too bad. I always enjoyed SLC in the past.

Just one arrival from LAX, but must compliment SLC on the easy and fast experience. Baggage on carousel within 5 minutes. Short walk to south end of terminal to TRAX station. Friendly volunteer ar TRAX helped us with tickets to downtown. Overall - great.

Consistently the worst airport I fly through. Typical example: Last Thursday 5/29/14. I enter security line about 10 am. I'm roughly #60 in line. One TSA drone checking I.D. stopping our line to process First Class and wheelchair passengers while we wait. Two agents are processing far fewer Pre-Screen passengers. When I reached the front of the line I count about 100 in line behind me. Inside as usual verbal instructions are lacking TV inaudible enforcement inconsistent. We endured 30+ minutes of this stupidity.

I arrived here on an international flight with only 45 minutes to make a connection. I'd given up hope more or less before landing but the Border Agency TSA and airport staff at SLC were superb. They picked people out of the lines with tight connections and then fast-tracked them through immigration customs baggage recheck and security with the result that both I and my checked luggage made it onto the connecting plane. This is the first time that I've connected from an international arrival at SLC but I have done so dozens of times at Delta's other European arrival hubs e.g. ATL and MSP and there is no way that I'd have made that connection at any of them.

Queuing times and cleanliness were both ok. The main problem is the small size of the airport and its layout. Almost all facilities for eating are inside security. If you are stuck for hours outside of security too bad. There is one small Starbucks in one terminal and one small 7-11 like snack store in the other. Car rental is in another building with no food across a road the parking garage. We arrived after 1 pm ready for lunch after of course having no airline food. The car rental companies are totally inept. The company we reserved with had no cars available period and only vaguely suggested we might get one after several hours. We and many others waited hours despite rental reservations in the parking facility with our luggage and no food. There was no where to store luggage while waiting so that one could at least take a taxi to get something to eat. We were stuck. Never have I seen such an awful airport or had such an awful airport experience.

Arrived from Denver for a day trip to Salt Lake City. SLC airport is very small and obviously just a regional airport. Two best options for getting to downtown are a UTA bus for $2.50 or a free shuttle provided by the Mormon church. The Mormon shuttle will take anyone of any religion to downtown and collect them later in the day and take them back to the airport free of charge. The only catch is you have to do a tour of the Temple Square complex which takes about 40 minutes and involves being guided by two young female missionaries. This tour is excellent but will involve your own religious beliefs being inquired about which I didn't mind but others may want to consider this. Airport itself is only 15 minutes from downtown unlike in most cities where it is some distance away. Airport had good stores albeit rather small. TSA staff were genuinely charming and helpful. Quite long lines for Southwest airlines check in and you MUST have your confirmation number for your flight or you can't check in. Security lines about the same length.

Spent more than 2 good hours at SLC due to our next connection flight. I can't complain about this place after our experience at LAX. There are plenty of choices to eat something and buy something. We were able to stretch our legs walking around every corner of SLC. Good layout they have there. People are friendly. When we arrived from LAX the airport was extremely busy toilets were clean. Plenty of information bays about where to go shops etc at SLC.

The airport itself is a kick back to the 1960s or 70s but recently is has been announced that SLC is going to bulldoze everything and start over. The airport has gotten more restaurants inside of security. Weather delays can be bad during or after a major storm but general not as bad as say Denver International. My only real complaint is that the airport is a major hub for Delta Air Lines not one of my favorites. Delta crams a lot of gates together and at times not enough seats for people waiting. The airport was designed to handle around 12 million passengers a year and it handles around 23-25 million a year. Lets hope for a modern well lit terminal.

Despite often being painfully crowded SLC is moderately convenient for people making connections especially on Delta. Unlike that other major Rocky Mountain hub Denver SLC seems to have many fewer weather delays. About once an hour when all the flights are in the whole airport is slammed but in between it isn't too bad. Each gate's waiting area has only about thirty seats for flights taking hundreds of passengers so crowding is unavoidable. The concourse bathrooms are way too small with too few toilets and not enough room to maneuver roller bags in and out. On the other hand there are plenty of shops and amenities inside security. Concourse E where commuter flights arrive and depart is massively confusing with a long row of gates jammed together just across a walkway from where thousands of passengers try to figure out where they need to go. It's an amazingly bad layout. Delta's SLC Crown Room is showing its age with worn furniture and tattered carpet but the free drinks and complementary T-Mobile wifi are welcome. The Crown Room can also be very crowded at certain times. Outside security the ticket area is too small for the number of passengers and there are often long winding lines to check in. The line outside the Terminal Two security entrance often extends all the way across the bridge to the parking garage then doubles back all the way to the security gate. SLC hint: If the Terminal Two security line is too long try going through security at the adjacent International Terminal. It is often wide open though the last time I was at SLC that checkpoint was closed. I guess the powers-that-be want us to wait in a long line! Car rental is very convenient being in the parking garage just across the street from the terminals and downtown Salt Lake City is very close. Overall SLC is a decent airport without enough facilities for the number of passengers traveling through pretty much like most American airports.

Flew Southwest into and out of SLC last week and have done the same about 4 times in the past 6 months. The airport is OK. Nothing spectacular just OK. Aesthetically it is pretty poor no personality and the restaurant choices could be a lot better. It's hard to find electricity outlets and there's no free wifi. That said it gets the job done. Check-in the walk to and from the gates baggage claim and the walk to the rental car counters are all pretty efficient. Arrivals and departures seem to be on time more often than not and if I were flying on Delta I would definitely use SLC over their other hubs.