Sitting at ORD wondering

MyassisDragon

MyassisDragon

Line Up and Wait
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Mr Fred
So unfortunately my family was in multiple places needing to converge on one destination for the thanksgiving holiday and making commercial flying for my own but the most economical. So here I am sitting in a commercial flight flying into ORD with foreflight running watching us taxi and I see these two things on the airport diagram....

A Scenic Holding pad and a Penalty Box....

The pilots were busy and I didn't get a chance to ask them.....so can someone here tell me what the heck these are for?

Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk HD
 
That's where they send people who require more attention than the ground controller has available.
 
MyassisDragon said:
So unfortunately my family was in multiple places needing to converge on one destination for the thanksgiving holiday and making commercial flying for my own but the most economical. So here I am sitting in a commercial flight flying into ORD with foreflight running watching us taxi and I see these two things on the airport diagram....

A Scenic Holding pad and a Penalty Box....

The pilots were busy and I didn't get a chance to ask them.....so can someone here tell me what the heck these are for?

Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk HD
Click to expand...


Ya got a screen shot for it???:dunno:
 
The penalty box I've come across before at IAD (I used to always prefer ATC-on-9 on United until the company went further down the tubes than I had previously imagined was possible). It's a big spot on the ramp where they park planes that can't get into their gate or wherever they are going.
 
A "penalty box" is a place they put planes that have landed but the gate is occupied. So, you troll on out to the penalty box and wait for your gate to clear or get a new gate assign,net from ops.

Pilots love them as you're still on the clock getting paid. Pax hate them as there a real psychological effect being cramped on a plane and being able to see 59 yards away where you want to be.
 
The "scenic hold pad" is just another area to hold planes. The name comes from that it's further away from the terminal and from there you can see the city as the terminal is out of the way. There's also the B Pad just north of the bridges. So, the normal progression is to fill up the Penalty box first, then the B pad and then the scenic hold pad.
 
Captain said:
A "penalty box" is a place they put planes that have landed but the gate is occupied. So, you troll on out to the penalty box and wait for your gate to clear or get a new gate assign,net from ops.

Pilots love them as you're still on the clock getting paid. Pax hate them as there a real psychological effect being cramped on a plane and being able to see 59 yards away where you want to be.
Click to expand...

And... As they watch their connecting flight push back from the gate...:mad::mad::mad:.....:mad2:
 
As others have stated, they're just places for waiting planes to sit. Some are also used for de-icing ops. Since ORD has so many, it's easier sometimes to just name them. So Penalty Box is a name for a penalty box no different than the Bravo Box.
 
Captain said:
The "scenic hold pad" is just another area to hold planes. The name comes from that it's further away from the terminal and from there you can see the city as the terminal is out of the way.
Click to expand...

Slight correction and clarification:

The "scenic hold pad" is so named because, back in the day, most of ORD's taxiways had names, not letters-- and the taxiway adjacent to the Scenic Pad (now "E") was the Scenic; it was fed at it's southwest end by the New Scenic and the Old Scenic.

That name was bestowed because, WAY back in the day, aircraft on that taxiway were actually taxiing through the woods on their way to 14L-- so it actually was "the scenic route".

When pilot's report that they don't have an available gate, the holding areas aren't filled in any particular order, it's more a matter of convenience, (depending on where the aircraft cleared the runway or it's destination on the airport). The Penalty Box is a favorite for United, and the B Pad is a favorite for American, since it puts them in close proximity to the gate where they'll eventually end up.

Of course, when things really hit the fan and the Ground Controllers are in survival mode, all such conventions go by the wayside-- they'll stash gatehold airplanes wherever it will get them out of their hair the quickest.
 
Call it what you want,not a nice place for the passengers.
 
flibmeister said:
Slight correction and clarification:

The "scenic hold pad" is so named because, back in the day, most of ORD's taxiways had names, not letters-- and the taxiway adjacent to the Scenic Pad (now "E") was the Scenic; it was fed at it's southwest end by the New Scenic and the Old Scenic.

That name was bestowed because, WAY back in the day, aircraft on that taxiway were actually taxiing through the woods on their way to 14L-- so it actually was "the scenic route".

When pilot's report that they don't have an available gate, the holding areas aren't filled in any particular order, it's more a matter of convenience, (depending on where the aircraft cleared the runway or it's destination on the airport). The Penalty Box is a favorite for United, and the B Pad is a favorite for American, since it puts them in close proximity to the gate where they'll eventually end up.

Of course, when things really hit the fan and the Ground Controllers are in survival mode, all such conventions go by the wayside-- they'll stash gatehold airplanes wherever it will get them out of their hair the quickest.
Click to expand...

As an F gate weeny it seemed like there was an order, but maybe that's because of our central location.
 
I don't think they de-ice in the penalty box or other hold areas. It always seems to occur at the gates at ORD. Probably some EPA concern. The FAA would really like all this to go on at the runway ends but that's not feasible at ORD either.
 
Good comments on here. Regarding de-ice at ORD, I remember an old manager told me why there's no de-ice on the hold pads or short of the runway. The hold pads at ORD don't have adequate drainage for type 1 or 4 glycol, so that's why de-ice occurs at the gate or ramp.

The pads help keep taxiways moving while letting aircraft wait "near" their occupied gate. At ORD, you don't stop on the inner or outer circle. Ever.
 
I just know that I've heard talk from the DO and chief pilot that we're getting a different ORD deicing location away from the gate, because our hold-over times were regularly expiring with the long taxi, as well as our passengers walking through the liquid when it's done at our gate.
 
MarkZ said:
Good comments on here. Regarding de-ice at ORD, I remember an old manager told me why there's no de-ice on the hold pads or short of the runway. The hold pads at ORD don't have adequate drainage for type 1 or 4 glycol, so that's why de-ice occurs at the gate or ramp.

The pads help keep taxiways moving while letting aircraft wait "near" their occupied gate. At ORD, you don't stop on the inner or outer circle. Ever.
Click to expand...

Don't even get me started on the Deice fluid problem at KJAC.. What makes it REALLY bad is Jackson Hole Airport is in a National Park, and you cannot even pick a single flower here without federal charges being brought..:eek:
 
MarkZ said:
The pads help keep taxiways moving while letting aircraft wait "near" their occupied gate. At ORD, you don't stop on the inner or outer circle. Ever.
Click to expand...
That's Alpha and Bravo. The FAA decided ten years or so ago that giving taxiways names like that made too much sense.

I'm surprised the Penalty Box and Scenic survived. The big deice/hold area at IAD got named Apron W (though it was internally called Block B by just about everybody except whatever guy assigns taxiway names). At least the FAA doesn't seem to have any authority to name rename other things that make too much sense like Cargo Ramps 1-6, etc...
 
I got to spend close to 3 hours in a penalty box at ORD ~18 years ago, while studying the back of seat 23A on a MD-83...

Back in the day when pax couldn't just sent out a tweet to scream "get me off this f--king plane!".
 
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