Travelers arriving and departing from Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International (ATL) now can hook up to the Internet for free.
The Atlanta City Council approved the installation cost of $5.6 million necessary to upgrade infrastructure at the airport enough to accommodate increased usership expected from the transition; travelers had previously had to spend $4.95 to go online.
Mayor Kasim Reed and General Manager Miguel Southwell announced the launch at ATL on Thursday. It took just under a month for airport information technology employees and contractors to install several hundred new access points across the 6.8 million-square-foot terminal. The new infrastructure can accommodate 15,000 simultaneous users, a seven-fold increase from the previous system.
“The lack of free Wi-Fi put our airport at a competitive disadvantage and it was the No. 1 complaint we would receive from our customers,” says Southwell. “Travelers now expect airports to offer free Wi-Fi, and this initiative is a prime example of our constant mission to improve the customer experience.”
