McCarran Airport which serves Las Vegas has the distinction of being the USA’s eighth busiest airport in terms of passenger volume. This fact may not seem entirely impressive until you realize that Las Vegas is not a hub for any airline. While Allegiant has a very strong presence here, Allegiant is not a real airline and should not be thought of as such.

When I make these sassy reports about airports, they usually begin with “Why your airport sucks…,” but Las Vegas (and I hate to even admit this) may buck that trend. However, Las Vegas is by no means the perfect airport which others should emulate. So what do we know about this enigmatic airport?

It is spread over five different concourses, though the “Big 3” — American, Delta, and United all occupy the D-gates along with Alaska. So if you flew on a real airline, your experience at McCarran would be limited to these gates. And your experience flying Allegiant, Southwest, and numerous others may have a drastically different feel. The D-gates appear newish. They have high ceilings, large windows, and open spaces. The Southwest and Allegiant gates appear to be in a dungeon of sorts — dark and confined under low-ceilings, but with a whiff of nostalgia for what flying must have been like in the 1970s.

Thusly one’s experience in this airport could be quite varied depending on your airline of choice. Assuming you’ve been smart and booked with a real airline, you get to hang out in the D-gates. Congratulations! You have a bit more personal space to spread out in, which is nothing to scoff at in the times we live in. That being said, security lines in Las Vegas are no joke. Like a popular nightclub on the strip, the average wait time is 37 minutes. Airports that are much busier have figured out how to get wait times to less than 10 minutes. Even inefficient Newark has figured it out, though they will verbally abuse you as you go through security, so that’s the trade off.

Once in, you must take a tram to your concourse. It is not the kind of airport that you can get dropped off and be at your gate in 15 minutes. If you rented a car, you would first have to go to the offsite car rental facility, take a slow bus to the terminal, go through the lengthy security, go down a long escalator, go on the tram, go up a long escalator, then walk to your gate. It’s not the most streamlined process.

Once inside the terminal (D-gates anyway), you will find a vast array of food and shopping options. This is where the airport gets its high marks from me. Food is totes important and a variety of options is appreciated. I tend to hit up the Quizno’s, though Cinnabon is popular at all times of the day. As I had to kill 5 and 1/2 hours in the airport today, I surrendered quickly to the temptation of the cinnamon aroma. I figured the 5.5 hours gave me enough time for the Cinnabon to work itself through my innards, get wrecked, find a bathroom, and recover in time to operate the flight to Los Angeles.

Now here’s where things get weird with McCarran. It is victim to the fact that it serves Las Vegas, one of the truly most awful cities in the United States. Las Vegas tries very hard to appear classy, but it is not. Movies like Ocean’s 11 try to give it the illusion of being sophisticated and the kind of place where men put on tailored suits and ladies don their finest dresses. Perhaps these high-roller types do exist, but they aren’t flying out of the D-gates. In their place are loud frat boys, honeymooners who couldn’t think of something more romantic than the Las Vegas strip, and countless bachelor/bachelorette parties. Two years ago, there was a group of loud English ladies, one of whom was wearing a chicken suit through the airport as this was her “Hen.” (commonwealth lingo for bachelorette party).

As we look across the D-gates once more, we see many high end shops selling jewelry, designer handbags, or fancy cosmetics. Nobody is ever in any of these stores unless they were cutting through to get to the Cinnabon. So why do they exist? It’s what the kids would call a bit “bougee.” Las Vegas and its visitors are not as sophisticated as they would all like to think, and this upscale shopping experience at the airport is just to make people feel fancy while they are in fact smoking a Virginia slim, drinking a Coors Light, and gambling at a slot machine in a glass cage in full view of passersby.

The airport is named after former Senator Pat McCarran, who authored various civil aviation bills, though it may soon be renamed. Evidently it isn’t considered très chic to have an airport named after someone who was anti-immigrant, anti-Semitic, and racist. He was also a little chummy with Joseph McCarthy, which is just embarrassing. The county board unanimously agreed to rename it after former Senator Harry Reid, but it will take a few months before it is official. I guess they figured Harry Reid is a boring enough politician that they needn’t worry about having to rename it again. Though to be fair, why even name it after a politician? In this day and age, politicians can be very polarizing figures. In an interview with the Associated Press, a critic suggested calling it Siegfried & Roy International Airport.

If the cause for renaming it is to show that the city doesn’t share the values of McCarran, what could be better than naming the airport after two hardworking homosexual* (technically never confirmed, but I mean . . .come on, let’s call a spade a spade) immigrants. Last year, we locked down, baked bread, watched Tiger King and lost 562,000+ American lives to Covid-19. I can think of no better memorial for this lost year than renaming this airport after the duo whose deaths were hastened by both a tiger attack and covid. The airport could even have a character mascot, which would be a white tiger wearing an airline captain’s hat obviously. I mean the board can still include Harry Reid. There is a place for his voice welcoming you on the tram and saying in a monotone deadpan, “Welcome to Las Vegas, Nevada, the city where anything goes. Please enjoy our world-class entertainment, but not too much. Uncle Harry will be keeping an eye on you. Now watch your fingers and toes while the doors close.” Long live Siegfried and Roy International Airport.