Things That Have Made Travel Better
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THE INNOVATION ISSUE 1 INFINITY POOLS Where does the water end and the horizon begin? That, in a nutshell, is the question sparked by the best infinity pools (also known as vanishing-edge pools, infinity-edge pools and negative- edge pools)—now a regular feature at many high-end hotels and resorts. The first such pool? At Versailles, bien sur. And we love this one, on the 57th floor of the Marina Bay Sands in Singapore. THINGS THAT HAVE MADE TRAVEL BETTER From the first transatlantic flights to boutique hotels and travel apps, the world’s far-flung pockets become more accessible and alluring every day. To celebrate Delta’s 85th anniversary, we picked a (subjective) list of the top 85 innovations from the past 200 years (or so) that make travel easier, safer and more exhilarating than ever. BY CHRIS CLAYTON, ELIZABETH DOYLE, SARAH ELBERT, STEVE MARSH & JASON OLIVER NIXON PORTRAIT ILLUSTRATIONS BY JOEL BENJAMIN The Wright brothers are credited with bringing us wing to wing with the birds in If you need to run to make your delta sk y / june 2014 2 THE AIRPLANE December 1903, when their Wright Flyer caught air in Kill Devil Hills, North Carolina. 3 MOVING WALKWAYSdelta skyconnection, / june anything 2014 that makes you 84 But New Zealand farmer Richard Pearce may have actually been the first in March 1902. move faster is worth its weight85 in gold. JET ENGINE Frank Whittle was a runty, 21-year-old math whiz in the SpaceX Royal Air Force when he invented the modern jet engine in 1929. Whittle’s superiors didn’t let him fly a plane for years after entering the RAF, but being grounded may have SPACE TRAVEL helped him solve the first huge conundrum in aviation 5 Back in 1961, when Soviet history: Planes cruising at high altitude are able to fly cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin faster and farther because they encounter less turbulence, became the first human to but the higher a plane flies, the worse the piston engine make it beyond the Earth’s performs in the thin air. Whittle’s compression engine atmosphere, it took the 4 heat of a Cold War to get You’ll likely encounter plenty solved this problem, paving the way for the modern com- 22 one of us up there. Today, of useful (and cool!) travel THE GRAND TOUR mercial airliner. billionaires such as Richard innovations on your next Delta From the 17th century Branson and Elon Musk are trip. Here are a few we love. until the mid-19th planning imminent private century, it was a rite space flight. Someday, we’ll The concierge team at The of passage mostly for Corinthia Hotel London CHECK-IN KIOSKS all be able to orbit in coach. 14 No one likes to wait in line if they don’t have to. gentlemen of a certain 11 The automated machines were a great step in making class (especially THE GUIDEBOOK CONCIERGE SERVICES travel even more convenient. English landed gentry) The modern travel book 6 Concierges have long been the to take The Grand Tour, dates to Murray’s Handbook holders of the golden keys at hotels: LIE-FLAT SEATS for Travellers, from 1836. a quasi-educational They can arrange everything from 15 Delta is the first Its publisher, the Baedeker tour through France, theater tickets to far-flung demands. airline to have full lie-flat company, quickly became Italy and, perhaps, The term originally hails from France BusinessElite seats with the gold standard for 19th- Greece. The goal was where the “concierge” controlled direct aisle access on all century travelers, while the keys to the royal household and of its wide-body overseas to absorb art, culture Fodor’s and Frommer’s took oversaw a range of responsibilities. planes. Many of them even feature Westin Heavenly and music in cities such center stage after World In the late 1990s, concierges moved Bedding, so your flight will soar by. as Florence, Venice and War II. Today, Lonely Planet, from the world’s top hostelries to Rome. Travelers on The Let’s Go, Rough Guides and stand-alone organizations 12 such MOBILE BOARDING PASSES Grand Tour would then “prestige” books such as Mr. as Quintessentially Lifestyle and 16 No more losing our paper boarding passes return home months & Mrs. Smith compete with Luxury Attache, which arrange between Starbucks and the gate! Delta offers later with crates filled digital apps. eBoarding passes in more than 200 cities. services and unparalleled access. with art and books that Luxury-minded credit cards offer set them apart in terms ONLINE TICKETING & CHECK IN similar services, too, such as of their class standing. American Express’ Platinum and 17 Each year, more than 23 million tickets are sold Vestiges of The Grand Black cards. in more than 104 countries worldwide via Delta.com. Tour continued well IN-FLIGHT WI-FI into the early 1900s 18 A decade ago, using the Internet at 30,000 after transportation feet was fantasy. But thanks to improvements in became easier and satellite and air-to-ground networks, today you can more democratized: SMOKING BANS (ON surf to your heart’s content. Delta now has Wi-Fi on Think literary character more than 3,400 flights daily—and it was the first PLANES, IN HOTELS AND Lucy Honeychurch 7 RESTAURANTS, ETC.) to announce that customers could use portable ambling through the Hallelujah! electronic devices below 10,000 feet. ONLINE TRAVEL AGENCIES streets of Florence When brick-and-mortar travel agencies FLY DELTA APP without a Baedeker in went on life support in the 1990s, online E. M. Forster’s classic 19 You can plan your trip, buy your tickets, planners jumped in to fill the void. Think check in, store your boarding passes, get flight novel A Room with a Expedia, Orbitz, Priceline, Travelocity— info, track your bags and more with this award- View. The typical Grand one-stop shops that book and sell hotel 8 “I don’t want to get the same winning app for smartphones and tablets, Tour itinerary began rooms, plane tickets and car rentals. And looks I give people when which has been downloaded 11 million times. in Dover, England, because every successful business model and continued on to IN-FLIGHT MEALS spawns a submodel, aggregators such as they get on a plane holding Belgium, France and Delta has raised the bar on Kayak and Hipmunk soon arrived on their 20 Switzerland before a baby: ‘That’s a cute baby, airline food with award-winning chefs heels. Then again, you can always just go to just keep walking, keep such as Michael Chiarello creating inflight a lengthy stay in Delta.com and take care of your tickets and BusinessElite menus on certain routes. Italy. Today, the term travel plans the old-fashioned way: right at walking, keep going, keep grand tour connotes the source. SEE PAGE 75 FOR PHOTO CREDITS going. .’ ” — ELLEN DEGENERES FLIGHT ATTENDANTS an extended tour of 21 Imagine if you had to get up to get continental Europe. your own drink. Yeah . exactly. Sure, they look ridiculous and aren’t the easiest to pack (unless First sold by Fuji in 1989, they revolutionized From Sky Miles to Starwood points, 9 THE delta NECK sk yPILLOW / june 2014you get the kind that blows up), but ergonomic travel pillows 10 DIGITAL CAMERAS the way we record our experiences, making it 13 REWARDS travel these days can sometimes feel delta sky / june 2014 86 make all the difference on long flights. Try the $40 Kuhi Comfort. easier and cheaper to capture images on the go. like a big game. Get in on it! 87 STANDARD HIGH LINE, NYC UNIQUE HOTEL 23 OFFERINGS Ever wanted to learn the ancient sport of falconry? The Greenbrier in West Virginia offers lessons. Or head to the Maasai Mara game reserve in Kenya and Cottar’s 1920s Safari Camp for Maasai warrior training. Today, hotels are helping travelers immerse themselves even deeper into the local culture. 28 EVOLUTION OF THE33 BOUTIQUE HOTEL VOLUNTOURISM 24 Global travelers are CRUISE SHIPS Thank British lifestyle guru/hotelier Anouska THE HOTEL increasingly choosing to The passenger cruise Hempel and American style setter/hotelier Ian MONACO, Schrager for launching the “boutique” hotel trend ALEXANDRIA, mix travel and philanthropy, industry began in England VIRGINA from building soccer in the 1840s, and it quickly in the 1980s. So what are the tenets of a boutique property? Unique design and architecture. fields to helping orphaned burgeoned, offering both 27 Attention to service. Location. The ability to lion cubs. Some well- steerage and plush transat- BLAKES HOTEL, “surprise and delight.” Think of the trend as a THE LUMEN, regarded programs include THE BOEING 747 lantic crossings. The industry LONDON DALLAS Roadmonkey, Globe Aware response to the impersonal and sprawling hotel The jumbo jet, queen of the recalibrated thanks to large and Habitat for Humanity— trend of the 1970s. Today, hoteliers such as Sean skies! Boeing debuted this passenger jets in the 1960s. but there are many more. 26 MacPherson (NYC’s The Marlton) and Jeff Klein two-story commercial jet Today, the cruise industry at- (LA’s Sunset Tower)—along with hotel groups ECOTOURISM THE EURO in 1969, and it flew its first tracts 20.1 million passengers such as the Ace and André Balazs The official currency of the commercial flight (with Pan worldwide. And while some Properties—continue to 25 We can get behind environmentally responsible eurozone debuted in 1999 to American World Airways) cruise liners are enormous, move the needle. travel that often pairs pristine eliminate fluctuation risks from New York to London smaller ships cater to those natural environs with sexy and exchange costs while en- the next year.