LGW - Any better now it's not BAA ?

Was chatting to a mate who's at LGW at the moment - flight to Berlin delayed.

Obviously he's not to happy plus he says the place is dirty, surley security etc etc

He was blaming BAA for all this but despite being a fairly regular traveller he didn't know that BAA had been forced to sell it off.

Anyway as I'm not a regular traveller from LGW (lets say once every 5 years) so can't comment.

Essentially my question is

Is LGW still as bad as it was ? the same? or has it got better?

And if so, how has it got better / worse?

Over to you ...

I have noticed a slight improvement, but it's still the same old Gatwick Airport.

On my last three flights from there, at least one bank of departure screens has frozen, and NOT ONE member of staff would believe it. I even showed one guy and his answer was that when he was looking at the CORRECT departure screen, the broken screen would show that too. He actually thought that the screen changed when he was not looking at it.

So you had hundreds of people waiting in front of these departure screens, with no inkling that they weren't being updated. Until I told them. Then some of them realised that they were at final boarding.

That said, I don't think it's any worse than any other airport and only location would influence my decision from where to fly. I certainly am not impressed with Terminal 5.

Last time we flew out from LGW was in Feb. We were flying in upper but had checked in online and travelled with hand luggage only. Went to security and the guy refused to let us through to fast track because we didn't have a fast track/priority sticker. Naturally I explained the class I was flying whilst he told me he understood what I was entitled to I wasn't allowed through to fast track as I had no sticker on the BP.

We went to the back of the long normal line and cut through the tensa barriers, he clocked me and made a move towards me but thankfully I reached another member of staff who actually had a clue and let me through and explained to this idiot why I was being let through.

Flew out of Gatwick on Thursday night and back in late last night(Sunday).

I do actually think it had improved a bit, I didn't feel as much pressure to shop as before and security on the way out was flowing very well and then coming back we were on the train to London within 15 minutes of landing, they had more than enough Borders staff in place (didn't want to walk the long way round to IRIS as it probably wouldn't be working!).

The Servisair check-in staff looked as if they were doing all the possible could to remove any glamour that is left in flying, oh for the good old days!

They are obviously putting a decent amount of cash back into the airport as there was a lot of cosmetic work going on as well as some structural but all done in a way that didn't inconvenience you too much. We were luck as we were South Terminal so didn't have to get the monorail replacement bus service to the North Terminal but it shows that they see the airport as an investment and not just a cash cow as BAA seemed to.

Also saw the signs for the Yotel and was very tempted to try next time I have a morning flight out of there, not sure how competative the price is but I love the concept.

I've stayed in the Yotel a couple of years ago, and it is a bit weird (don't stay there if you are claustrophobic), but it was great for the 4am checkin that I had to make ...

Definitely worth it for the early checkins at the south terminal.

Crispin