Airlines are now asking U.S. to cut back on security measures

ATLANTA The grace period for air travel has ended. Gone are the days of goodwill after the Sept. 11 attacks, when passengers, airlines and airports were willing to put up with all kinds of intrusive and time-consuming security measures. Gone, too, are the months when carriers desperately wooed frightened travelers by catering to their needs, and when well-intentioned U.S. officials optimistically laid out new safety plans.

Now, airlines and airports are vigorously lobbying the government to scale back or modify many of its new safeguards. Passengers are clamoring for more consistent and less exasperating security procedures. And airlines are cutting back on passenger services and creating ticket restrictions they never would have dared put in place last fall. Hartsfield Atlanta International, the busiest airport in the world, is grappling with many of the issues hanging over the industry a full year after the terrorists struck, transforming air travel more than any aspect of daily life. The airport serves as a hub for Delta Air Lines, the third-largest carrier in the United States, and AirTran Airways, a fast-growing low-fare carrier.

No single industry was hit harder by the attacks than the airlines, which have lost $10 billion in the last year.

Besides resorting to drastic cost-cutting efforts to stay aloft, the airlines are engaged, along with airports like Hartsfield, in a contentious debate with the 10-month-old Transportation Security Administration over what security measures should be cut back.

The airlines openly object to security measures that they say have scared away customers, especially on short flights.

The Transportation Security Administration "has the best intentions in the world," said Frederick Reid, Delta's president. "But unless you keep the law enforcement focus and add customer service and efficiency to it," he said, "you will kill aviation."

Delta has been one of the most outspoken airlines about dropping certain security procedures, such as searching carry-on bags at the boarding gate.