Towards a Psychogeography of the Long-haul Flight: Part V

Entering the departure lounge of Terminal 2 in Manchester airport, I was immediately surrounded by the racks, stands and shevles of the duty free shop. There had been an interior redesign of the terminal and there was now no direct path to the departure gates. Rather, I had to weave my way through the shop space. The duty-free store had become an inescapable part of my passage to the departure gate. It was there to navigate even before I could see the departure screen.

Retail space is embedded in the airport terminal and its inescapability is connected to the heightened security of the airport. There is no conspiracy here. But retail takes the opportunities that tight security provide. Currently there is a liquid restriction on all British flights, with liquids confiscated if over 100 ml. However, the exact same product can be purchased once passed the security check.

However, perhaps more importantly for retailers is that once a passenger passes through the security check, they cannot turn back. The passengers present a captive audience and new airport terminals have taken this on board in their design. Terminal 5 of Heathrow expects 30 million passengers to pass through every year, but only 700 seats have been provided. A tired, weary, passenger will, almost by necessity, have to enter a shop, restaurant, cafe or bar to find a seat. With Heathrow Terminal 5 as an example, the modern transport hub is designed for pimpin' cash out of passengers. As Mark Riches, Managing Director of World Duty Free, stated, "If we can't sell to people who can't leave the building, then there is something wrong with us". ('30 million passengers, 23,00 square metres of shops . . . and just 700 seats' in The Guardian, Friday 15 June, 2007)

Towards a Psychogeography of the Long-Haul Flight IV

It is only after parking his car, checking in his luggage, clearing his identity check and buying the necessary duty free gifts that Marc Auge's generic traveller, Pierre Dupoint, feels at ease. And it is only once the fasten seatbelt light has been switched and the plane is at cruising altitude, does Dupont feel relaxed enough to feel "alone at last". (Non-Places, 1992, p. 6). Pierre Dupont is not only important because he presents a passage through the little stresses, time demands and ??? but also because his passage through the airport becomes an exchange where anonymity is granted for time spent in a generic and bland space - a non-place. Auge's thesis opens into an account of the non-place and in Auge's words, "If a place can be defined as relational, historical, and concerned with identity, then a space which cannot be defined as relational, or historical, or concerned with idetity will be considered a non-place" (77 -78). The airport, for Auge, typifies non-place. Non-places pass avoid the very spaces that they exist alongside, or pass through. A traveller can buy wooden tulips in Schipfol airport without needing to visit Amsterdam or even legally enter the Netherlands. As Auge writes, "the traveller is absolved of the need to stop or even look" (97). Airports present physical and permanent structures with little or no direct contact with the surrounding area. The air-traveller, especially those using an airport for connecting flights, needs to historic relation to the place it is in and the airport offers no historic relation in return. However, for Auge an exchange does take place - the air-traveller, devoid of spaces with historic and identity relations, is offered anonymity in return. In airports almost all are travellers and simply transient visitors off to elsewhere. Relations to sites and spaces do not need to be formed, nor do relations between individuals.

Auge's thesis offers an interesting starting point to uncovering a psychogeography of the long-haul flight. Benjamin's boredom and waiting becomes an offer of anonymity in exchange for passage through a non-place. However, Auge's thesis is only a beginning, and certainly limited. Relations do take place in airports. Now, more than ever, identity is essential to air-travel. And in an airport relations and identity are determined by the convergence of commerce and security. It is capital and security that govern relations in an airport, to an extent no seen in any other transport hub. A psychogeography of the long-haul flight will uncover and examine this relationship.