- Real ID rules took effect on Wednesday after more than 20 years.
- Ahead of the deadline, thousands of Americans still had not upgraded their state IDs.
- At airports in New York City and Atlanta, wait times were low and compliance was high.
Amid warnings of long lines, confusion, and last-minute scrambles, the nationwide Real ID rollout arrived with an unexpected twist: calm.
Leading up to the deadline, some 81% of flyers were presenting adequate ID, the Transportation Security Administration said, leaving hundreds of thousands still in need of an upgrade.
Business Insider reporters were on the ground at two of the US' busiest airports — New York City's LaGuardia Airport and Atlanta's Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport — to see how the new rules would play out. We weren't the only ones eager to capture the possible chaos; news crews also littered the terminals, cameras ready.
As the first few hours passed, things appeared surprisingly organized. There were no snaking security lines, travelers largely came prepared with the right documentation, and the TSA ran a two-line strategy to keep things moving.
Wait times were low, and there was a separate system for people without a Real ID
Wednesday is generally a low travel day, and posted wait times for the regular checkpoint at both airports — including across all of their respective terminals — were less than 10 minutes during the morning rush. Even less so for TSA Pre Check.
Airport employee Jayden Martinez in LaGuardia's Terminal B told BI that passengers without a Real ID are put in a separate security line, but it's "not really affecting the TSA wait times."
Everyone with an acceptable ID, including Real ID and passports, is given a slip of paper indicating they're good to fly. Another employee said there have been far more compliant than noncompliant travelers.
Martinez said crowds could change on a busier travel day. Two employees in Terminal C, who asked not to be named, said the same. New York's Real ID compliance is only about 45%.
Across the river in New Jersey, where compliance is among the lowest in the country at about 19%, government-posted TSA wait times at Newark Liberty International Airport were between two and 18 minutes.
In Atlanta, throngs of rope lines were out in apparent anticipation of crowds. But with nearly 100% compliance in Georgia, security lines were similarly empty on Wednesday morning.
"We've had low Real ID noncompliance, even lower than expected," lead TSA officer Alexis Pickeral told BI. People without a Real ID were given a red noncompliance card and face more thorough screening of their bags and persons. "It doesn't take very long," Pickeral said.
Travelers were budgeting extra security time
Ahead of the deadline, which was in the works for nearly 20 years, the government and airlines warned about potentially long security queues and encouraged people to arrive earlier than normal. Most appeared to have heeded their advice.
Scott Adkins and Erin Courtney were flying from New York to Illinois, and both knew about the Real ID deadline. They said they arrived an extra 45 minutes early.
Adkins said he got his Real ID years ago without even realizing it, but Courtney wasn't able to get an appointment and instead brought her passport (halfway through her conversation with BI, she double-checked that her passport wasn't expired).
"As soon as they started announcing it, that's when I started thinking about it, but I didn't do anything or try to make an appointment until like a month ago," Courtney said. She added that her local DMV was telling people who have passports not to get their Real ID now.
Two women from Birmingham, Alabama, who were leading a college trip, said they arrived early at LaGuardia. Both had their Real IDs and knew it was the first day of implementation. They asked for anonymity because they work at a university.
Getting the updated license, however, wasn't so easy — one of them had to return to the DMV three separate times and only got it five days ago, they said. For about four months leading up to the trip, they told students they would need to have a Real ID or a passport.
Hayden B, who has a Real ID and was alerted about the enforcement deadline a few weeks before her flight by both Delta Air Lines and the government, said she had no issues at the checkpoint when flying from Las Vegas to Atlanta on Wednesday.
"This was my first time flying, security took five minutes," she said.
