Useful Links

At Home Town Travel, we have clients who fly once a week (no kidding!) and we also deal with new travelers who have never before set foot in an airport and everything/everyone in between.  This section applies to all of them - useful website links for local, national, and international sources of information that we hope will help in learning about your destination or about the industry in general. 

LOCAL

Flying out of Newark, Kennedy, or LaGuardia?  Using the bridges or tunnels to get into New York City?  Check ahead with the Port Authority regarding airport status, flight delays, and public transportation.  If you're day tripping into the City, check out real-time views of traffic conditions here.

If you're driving into Philadelphia, check out the Delaware River Port Authority Website for bridge info and/or transit schedules for getting around in the city, and if you're flying out or picking loved ones up, consult the airport's site for everything you need to know.

Going gambling for the first time?  Want to try and find all the streets from Monopoly? (It's not that tough, trust me.)  Try the Atlantic City Convention and Visitors Bureau.

Sticking with the Atlantic City info, finding out about the entertainment in town or dining in and out of the casinos is easy at acweekly.com.  

NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL

Find out about the airline industry at the Federal Aviation Administration Website. 

There's a smaller piece of the FAA site that updates real-time conditions at 39 major airports around the country.  The site does NOT give individual flight delays, but is great for checking into more widespread delays, such as weather problems.  Any possibly confusing air-traffic-speak is clearly explained in the Glossary.  The Air Traffic Control System Command Center

Ever curious what the pilots and controllers discuss?  LiveATC.net is a site for you - exactly as advertised, live streaming audio (on a roughly five-second delay) from control towers and Centers around the world.  Major commercial airports that can be found under the Class B listing include JFK, Dallas-Fort Worth, Boston, and Los Angeles, to name a few.

Learn more about the cruising experience at CLIA's Website.  CLIA is the Cruise Lines International Association. 

Do you need to see your doctor before departing?  You might not think so, but just in case, check with the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) in Atlanta.  They're the definite authority on being medically prepared for international travel.

One of the things never on the news about the CIA is their excellent annual publication, the World Factbook.  Check it out here and learn the basics of any country you could think to visit.

Great hotels around the world have one thing in common: their spectacular concierge service.  The American chapter of Les Clefs d'Or ("keys of gold") prides itself on service through friendship.