A colleague and I were on a business trip in Chicago this past Thursday and Friday. This past Friday was the coldest day so far this winter in Chicago. We woke to a crisp -10F, I am sure it can get colder but neither my colleague nor I were interested in sticking around to find out. Needless to say we were set on making our 2:40PM flight.
Past trips to this customer leaving for O'Hare at noon was tight but you would make the flight. We had a meeting 10-noon and left promptly at noon. I have been to this customer several times and know the route to/from O'Hare, however I started up Google Navigation on my phone. As we approached I294 to head south toward O'Hare, I realized that Navigation was not directing us to I294. The 'light' in the lower right was red (it's normally green) and Navigation was indicating 30min to destination which was normal. I decided to follow Navigation which took us on side streets all the way to the rental car return at O'Hare.
As we approached the rental car return from the back side, we noticed that the highway was completely stopped, the front entrance into the rental car return was stopped. Police were everywhere blocking traffic. There were also large groups of people holding Chinese flags. We returned the car and asked what was going on. Turns out Chinese President Hu Jintao was on his way back to the airport after a visit. We saw his motorcade drive by within 15 minutes of retruning the rental car and we were on the way to the terminal within 20 minutes.
We made our flight without any issue, in fact there was virtually no line at the security check point. I am not so sure we would have made it if I had ignored Google Navigation. If you have an Android phone, are headed somewhere, are interested in know how long it will take your and want to get there on time it's worth it to fire up Google Navigation. It just may save you from a major traffic headache. This was not the first time Google Navigation has guided me around a major traffic issue however this appears to be the first time it has saved me from missing a flight.
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