The Financial Times' Jurek Martin is peeved. He hates Dulles Airport, the large international gateway way out in the Virginia suburbs so much so he calls it a "hell hole" and has even called the Post to press them to investigate Dulles and break the "silence in the American media" about its horrid service, particularly its far-from-tolerable waits to clear security in the Eero Saarinen-designed terminal.

From Martin's "Letter to America" in this weekend's FT:

Two recent personal trips, and anecdotal evidence beyond number, show an airport in chaos -- think Calcutta, Nairobi or any other erstwhile Third World hell hole, where to get on or off a flight was often an achievement in itself, and you have Dulles. This is not exactly appropriate for the world's only superpower.

Here are Martin's main beefs with Dulles, which are on point if you'd ask any reasonable passenger using the airport:

- The long security process is mismanaged and at times non-sensical. He cites an instance where he saw a security agent "order a mother to pass a three-month-old separately through screening (by rolling te child through, perhaps)."
- Dulles is far out, 25 miles from the center of the city, without train access, but there is the "under-advertised" bus service which runs to the West Falls Church metrorail station. (Don't forget about the express 5A metrobus to Rosslyn and L'Enfant Plaza.) Also the "ubiquitous blue van facility" which can take its time "depositing you at your destination." (DCSOB noted that these blue van services may have been involved in the Hunters Brooke subdivision arson ...)
- Cabs to/from Dulles are expensive

While all of this isn't really mind-blowing news to locals, we're sure it's enlightening travel information for the FT's international readership who may find themselves coming to D.C. via Dulles. But Martin seems to forget one major thing: the mobile lounges.

For those who have never been through Dulles, to get from the main terminal to the concourses, one must use the mobile lounges, or as DCist likes to call them, moon rovers. These elevated vehicles on large tires mix with tarmac traffic to bring passengers to and from the gates. We're sure they were cool back in the 1960s, but they're a little past their prime.

But as part of Dulles' capital improvement plan, the moon rovers are being done away with. An newly opened underground walkway now connects the main terminal to the Concourse B. Eventually a train system will link the terminal and concourses.

So which airport is your preferred gateway in and out of D.C.?