Travel guide ranks best, worst airport terminals

— -- Stuck in a weather delay at Newark Airport two days before Christmas last month, travel editor Jason Clampet says he saw an airport terminal at its worst.

"An hour-long wind delay made a mess of Terminal A," says Clampet, senior online editor of Frommers.com. "There weren't any seats, people were sitting on any available floor space, and the bathrooms looked like the aftermath of a Giants-Cowboys game."

For many travelers, an airport terminal provides the first impression — and the final word — about a destination. It's also a place where travelers spend much time, particularly waiting for departing or connecting flights.

With that in mind, Frommers.com has provided USA TODAY with its choices of best and worst airport terminals. Newark's Terminal A — despite Clampet's bad experience — did not make the worst list. But another nearby terminal did.

The travel guide publisher says the best and worst choices were based on cleanliness, services, on-time departures, navigation and the ease of getting to and from a city's center.

The world's best, according to Frommers.com, is Hajj Terminal at King Abdul Aziz International Airport in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. It covers 120 acres and is only open during the six-week Hajj, when millions of Muslims make a pilgrimage to Mecca.

Two years ago, the terminal received an American Institute of Architects award for an architectural design "that has stood the test of time for 25 years," the institute says.

"The most stunning feature," Frommers.com says, "is that the terminal consists of 210 white fiberglass tents that create a chimney effect cooling the hot desert air."

Only one airport terminal in the USA — JetBlue Airways' Terminal 5 at New York's JFK airport — finished in the top 10.

The terminal, designed by Eero Saarinen for now-defunct airline TWA, is "one of the greatest icons of the mid-20th Century jet age," Frommers.com says. The terminal, it says, "has been intelligently swallowed by the grasping tendrils of JetBlue's modern new terminal, which has by far the best airport food court in New York."

Cozy with a dramatic view

The world's second-best terminal is Leifur Eiríksson Air Terminal in Keflavik, Iceland, about a 45-minute drive from Reykjavík, the nation's capital.

Fourteen passenger airlines fly into the airport during the summer, including Icelandair and SAS, which operate year-round service.

"Iceland's cozy, little international airport looks like it arrived in a flat pack from Ikea," Frommers.com says. "It's all blond wood and volcanic-looking stone with big windows looking out on the dramatic Icelandic landscape."

The seven other terminals in the travel guide publisher's top 10 are at airports serving Seoul; Wellington, New Zealand; Singapore; Madrid; Marrakech, Morocco; Montevideo, Uruguay; and Bilbao, Spain.

"If a city has an excellent terminal, it says to the visitor that they're thought about," Clampet says.

"Cleanliness, good light, space to rest between flights, decent food and some strategically placed plugs are enough to say to visitors, 'We know you'd rather be somewhere else right now, but while you're here, we'll take care of you.' "

Frommers.com says such customer care is lacking at the world's worst terminals.