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OAG Airline Awards Shortlist Announced

OAG (Official Airline Guide), a leading global authority on flight information, has released the shortlist for the 26th OAG Airline Industry Awards. The winners will be announced at the Awards ceremony on Wednesday, 4 June in the opulent art deco setting of The Bloomsbury Ballroom in central London. Boeing is the Awards' headline sponsor.

A total of 45 different airlines, three more than in 2007, have received nominations in 15 regional and global categories.

Air Canada, American Airlines, Continental Airlines, Delta Air Lines and United Airlines are nominated for best airline based in North America, while the nominees for best airline in Central, South America and the Caribbean include Aeromexico, Copa Airlines, LAN Airlines, Mexicana and TAM Brazilian Airlines. In 2007 the respective winners were Continental and Aeromexico. Airlines within North American are also strongly represented in the best Transatlantic category with three of the five nominees being US carriers.

Three TripAdvisor Travel Apps on MySpace

TripAdvisor, which markets itself as the world's largest travel community, has announced the launch of three of the web's top travel-focused social applications on MySpace, one of the most popular social networks. The applications, Cities I've Visited, Local Picks and Traveler IQ Challenge developed by Travelpod have been downloaded by more than six million users, and each provide the MySpace audience with unique ways to share travel information with friends, to challenge each other and to learn. Empowered by MySpace's newly announced Developer Platform, TripAdvisor was able to easily test and deploy the three popular applications in a few short weeks.

Cities I've Visited Travel Map

Sharing stories is half the fun of travel, and Cities I've Visited lets travelers quickly create an interactive travel map to share and compare with friends. They can pin all the cities, towns, and even suburbs they've visited -- and all the places they plan to visit. Cities I've Visited covers more than 20,000 destinations and is available in French, Italian, German and Spanish, enabling MySpace users all over to share their travel maps in their local language.

Carnival Rolls Out Redesign of Web Site

Carnival.com, the cruise industry's most visited Web site, has undergone an extensive redesign and emerged with a host of new features, including enhanced navigation and layout, a variety of images and content, and numerous technical advancements, all designed to make users' on-line experience easier and more informative than ever.

Highlighting the next generation of carnival.com are dozens of entertaining new videos and virtual tours, along with upgraded images and content showcasing all 22 of the line's "Fun Ships." Also included are upgrades to special sections focusing on various aspects of the Carnival vacation experience such as dining, spa, youth programs, destinations and shore excursions.

The "new and improved" carnival.com features an enriched Gifts and Services section that allows visitors to purchase a variety of items that can be delivered to guests' staterooms prior to their cruise. The section also includes detailed product descriptions for gifts ranging from special occasion cakes, fine wines and flowers to stateroom decorations and wedding/romance-themed gift packages.There is also an updated section where first-time cruisers and visitors can sign up for Carnival news and information via both email and RSS feeds.

iPhone Web Application for Rental Cars

Payless Car Rental has launched an iPhone and iPod Touch optimized website. Payless, a low-cost rental car company, is one of the first car rental agencies to build a customized version of its website for the iPhone and iPod Touch.

"Payless saw the need to create a slimmed-down version of its new website for the iPhone and iPod Touch community," said Jeff Lin, Project Leader of Payless' web marketing strategy team. "Payless' iPhone interface adds convenience and loads up faster than a full website would on an iPhone or iPod Touch," he added. "By pointing their iPhone or iPod Touch to http://www.PaylessCarRental.com, iPhone and iPod Touch users can book a car in just three easy steps."

iPhone users make up nearly one-third of smartphone users in the U.S., and the Safari browser is already the most popular mobile browser in the United States. Since Apple launched the iPhone last June, the iPhone has catapulted to number two in U.S. smartphone market share, trailing only Research In Motion's Blackberry.

Frequent-flyer Flexibility on Alaska Air

This could start well a trend, one that will directly benefit flyers in search of flexibility. CheapFlights.com reports that Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan members can now redeem their miles for one-way passage anywhere Alaska Airlines and partner Horizon Air fly.

The move marks the first of its kind by a major United States carrier, affording flyers some attractive alternatives never open before. The new deal allows flyers to book one-way travel for half the mileage of round-trip awards. Case in point: fly intra-Alaska, say from Anchorage (ANC) down to Juneau (JNU) for 7,500 miles. On the wider-ranging Alaska route structure, fly to a US or Canadian destination for 10,000 miles on a Saver Award, and 20,000 miles on a Peak Award.

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Author asks, Can We Trust jetBlue?

"What you do has far greater impact than anything you say. You just can't talk your way out of problems you behave yourself into, and jetBlue just behaved themselves into a doozy," says leadership authority, Stephen M. R. Covey, author of The Speed of Trust. "The truth is you can behave yourself out of problems and that is just what jetBlue's CEO, David Neeleman, is doing."

JetBlue has earned the benefit-of-the-doubt on issues of customer service based on their track record and credibility. "I am aware of at least one occasion where Neeleman personally drove to the New York Kennedy airport and checked passengers in on his own laptop," Covey said. "Interestingly, jetBlue is being held to a higher standard because of their reputation and outstanding customer service record." BusinessWeek reported jetBlue's average delay between February 13 and 15 was 230 minutes based on FlightStats, a travel data company, while Delta Air Lines' average was 205 minutes and American Airlines' was at 202."

Few On-time Arrivals for Amtrak

Passenger trains in the US are frequently late because freight trains have priority. Yep, that's right. Passenger trains wait on a rail siding while another load of consumer goods from China goes by. So, the answer is simple: Congress passes a law that says people are more important than freight and that passenger trains have priority over freight trains. Too simple? Well, consider that building more roads and highways for single-occupant automobiles is not the answer.
-- Editor, PassengerNews.com

WASHINGTON -- The Capitol Limited, an Amtrak train from Chicago, is scheduled to arrive in Washington every day at 1:30 p.m. But, the 764-mile route is among Amtrak's most dismal performers, with just 11 percent of trains arriving within 30 minutes of their scheduled time last year. But the problem exists to one degree or another on the majority of Amtrak routes.

The main reason: In most of the country, the national passenger railroad operates on tracks owned by freight railroads, and the tracks are badly congested.

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Alaska Air Opposes Passenger Rights Bill

Officials at Alaska Airlines said they'll oppose any effort by the federal government to institute a national "Airline Passenger Bill of Rights," saying that the airline already has a "strong commitment in place" to take care of its passengers.

In the wake of reports of JetBlue passengers reportedly stuck on planes for more than 10 hours after a storm hit the East Coast last month, Congress is considering adopting a national Airline Passenger Bill of Rights.

But officials at the subsidiary of Seattle-based Alaska Air Group Inc. said no national mandate is needed and they'll join with the Air Transport Association and other airlines to oppose the "bill of rights" for passengers.

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Chertoff Press Conference On REAL ID

Here is a transcript of the press conference held by Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff. If I had been there, or if Chertoff phoned to ask my opinion, which is not likely, I would have asked why there is not more recognition by the government of public resistance to the national identification program. The concern is not so much the ID itself, but rather the database. What safeguards will there be? Who has access to the database? Will information gathered on passengers at airports be used for anything other than travel safety? What recourse will citizens have for erroneous personal information in the database? And, there is the issue of another unfunded federal mandate. Once again, Washington passes a new law, but shirks responsibility by telling the states to come up with the money.
-- Editor, PassengerNews.com

Secretary Chertoff: Good morning, everybody. One of the first and most important priorities at the Department of Homeland Security is to protect America from individuals who are trying to do us harm. When we investigated the infamous attacks of September 11, 2001, one of the things that we discovered was that 18 of the 19 perpetrators had been issued U.S. identification documents, including state driver's licenses, and that some of these documents had been obtained fraudulently.

Two of the hijackers, Hani Hanjour and Khalid al-Mihdhar obtained the paperwork for their Virginia driver's licenses by handing $100 to an illegal alien in a convenience store parking lot. And then, that alien signed the forms attesting that these two hijackers were local residents. And, it was that fake ID, those phony driver's licenses that enabled these hijackers and others to rent cars, board planes, and otherwise take the steps they needed to carry out their murderous plans.

What's New with Europe's Low-fare Airlines?

Travelers to Europe are often unaware of the many point-to-point bargain airlines that serve almost all major cities and many smaller cities. These airlines offer one-way tickets without the price penalties imposed by the major carriers. And, for North Americans going to Europe without a definite return date, only Aer Lingus offers low one-way fares from New York to Dublin. But, these low fare airlines, like Southwest, must be booked directly on company web sites. You will not learn about these low fares from your travel agent or online virtual travel agencies such as Expedia and Travelocity. Here's a good introduction to Europe's low fare airlines by SmarterTravel.com
-- Editor, PassengerNews.com

It's no secret that flying Europe's no-frills, low-fare airlines is a popular -- and cheap -- way to get around the Continent (and not just for the student crowd, either). The demand is such that more than 45 carriers have sprouted up to serve Europe. With the peak summer travel season just around the corner, now's a good time for a refresher on Europe's most popular low-fare carriers, and a look at what's new with each.

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