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The Associated Press Updated 12:31 PM Saturday, November 7, 2009

HEBRON, Ky. — The Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International Airport has a new $23 million security checkpoint building, where airline passengers will be screened before heading off to catch their flights.

The Kentucky Enquirer reports that the new facility, which opened fully within the past week, is expected to speed up the security process.

"It used to be that it would be hard to get people into the shortest lanes because you couldn't see what's going on downstairs," said Paul Wisniewski, the local federal security director for the Transportation Security Administration. "This should run a lot smoother than in the past, and even then we didn't have very long wait times even during peak times."

Construction on the new checkpoint began in 2007 after being approved by the Kenton County Airport Board the previous year.

Airport spokeswoman Barb Schempf said the facilities were needed despite the dramatic drop in flights and passengers in the last three years, because the screening area served the local market and not passengers transferring through Delta Air Lines' hub here.

The airport paid for almost all of the new building and checkpoint, with the TSA contributing $700,000 for a new security camera system.

The new checkpoint has 10 screening lanes — one more than the old facility — and eventually will have new X-ray machines as well.

"In the end, it will improve the overall process," Schempf said.

Wisniewski said that the local security operation is handling between 8,000-9,000 passengers daily. And since Delta lowered its fares last February, local traffic has increased, although it is up only 2 percent through September as compared with last year.

Along with the checkpoint, the TSA is switching over to a new $16 million automated system to screen checked luggage. Before, TSA workers fed bags into screening machines by hand, but the agency started using the new conveyor belts over the past month, and will entirely stop loading bags by hand by the end of the month.

The TSA paid for $11 million of that work, while the airport added $5 million.

Wisniewski said that before the new system was in place, workers would have to pick up "120-130 percent of the bags (by hand), meaning we would handle some twice."

"Now, we're handling less than 10 percent, and when we're done, we expect to handle 2-3 percent," he said.

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Information from: The Kentucky Enquirer, http://www.nky.com

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November 07, 2009 05:27 PM EST

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