It was reported recently that the Atlanta airport has delayed selecting/deploying a registered traveler program. I am a Clear member and love it. In response to Atlanta's decision, Steve Brill, CEO of Clear, recently e-mailed members, here's a copy of that e-mail:

I'm writing to you with frustrating news about a needless delay of the Registered Traveler program at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport.

When Hartsfield-Jackson began its process of choosing a service provider for the program last October, we cheered the news and quickly opened an enrollment center in downtown Atlanta. We anticipated lanes opening in December or January, because the entire process has generally taken about three months (although in some places, such as San Francisco and Salt Lake City, it has moved considerably faster).

However, through the winter we heard no decision from the Airport. Then, last Friday afternoon - six months after the process began, during which time four other major airports launched Registered Traveler programs - the Airport announced that because of plans to build four additional security lanes it was delaying implementation of the program until this summer.

Hartsfield-Jackson is run by some of the most dedicated, highly regarded professionals in the industry. So we hesitate to be critical of this decision. However, we are disappointed and surprised, for the following reasons:

1. We have implemented Clear at airports - such as Washington Dulles and San Jose - where construction was going on. If anything, Clear has helped to ease crowding during that time.

2. Atlanta Airport stated that its goal in adding the new lanes was to reduce average wait time to twenty minutes or less. Even if achieved, this would still mean that some would stand in line forty minutes or longer and that no one would have the simple, predictable five minutes or less passage through security that Registered Traveler's 140,000 members now enjoy at 17 airports across the country. So, even after the new lanes are added, a Registered Traveler program will be needed.

3. Indeed, even with the addition of just four new lanes to ATL's current 28 lanes (a 14% increase), Hartsfield-Jackson will have fewer lanes per departing passenger than Orlando - which pioneered Registered Traveler and is glad it did.

4. And Clear's lane concierges - plus the prospect of new, enhanced security equipment - make Clear's Registered Traveler lanes move so much faster that they absorb more people than the other lanes while still speeding them through - which means that all travelers in all lanes move through the airport faster.

5. The Airport's construction program will cost the Airport $25m, according to the Airport's own announcement. Registered Traveler costs the Airport nothing. In fact, it will bring concession revenue to the Airport, plus hundreds of new jobs to Atlanta. In fact, in our proposal Clear offered to build and staff a whole new lane for the Airport - which, according to the Airport's announcement, would be worth more than $6m. So, while the building of four new lanes is obviously beneficial, one of them could have been built at no cost to the Airport or City taxpayers, plus generate concession revenue and new jobs for the City. So, why not do both?

6. Clear's lanes could be operating and speeding travelers through security within four weeks of approval, whereas the construction program is scheduled for this summer. Again, why not do both?

In short, there is nothing about this lane construction project that should preclude Registered Traveler, while everything about the modest goals of that project actually makes the case for Registered Traveler stronger.

We hope to meet soon with the Mayor and the Airport to review these facts and persuade them to change this decision to delay the program. At the same time we are working with one or more of the major airlines operating out of Hartsfield-Jackson to make arrangements for them to sponsor Clear in Atlanta immediately, an alternative that the Transportation Security Administration has allowed when an airport chooses not to act on its own.

Thousands of you have written or emailed us about ATL in recent months. So, I suspect that you are as frustrated as we are.

Therefore, I hope that you will help us bring Clear to Atlanta immediately by contacting the following key decision makers and sharing your view that it's time that Atlanta implement this common-sense, cutting edge program.

Indeed, both the Mayor and City Council have to approve the $25m construction program; so, it seems logical to ask them to make sure at the same time that the faster-track, highly beneficial, and revenue-producing Registered Traveler program is not delayed any further.

Here are the officials you might want to contact:

- Shirley Franklin, Mayor of Atlanta, sfranklin@atlantaga.gov, 404.330.6100
- Benjamin DeCosta, Aviation Manager, Atlanta Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport, 404.530.6600
- Council President Lisa Borders, President, Atlanta City Council, lmborders@atlantaga.gov, 404.589.1037
- Council Member Clair Muller, Chair, Atlanta City Council Transportation Subcommittee, cmuller@atlantaga.gov, 404.330.6051

I travel *through* Atlanta quite a bit, so I don't have to deal with security that often, but if I lived in Atlanta I'd be furious.