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Life > Experiences

Things to Know When Flying Out Of YVR

Paige Peters
The opinions expressed in this article are the writer’s own and do not reflect the views of Her Campus.
This article is written by a student writer from the Her Campus at U Vic chapter.

It’s been six years since I last flew out of Vancouver’s International Airport (YVR) and yet so much has changed. I’ve never seen as many cars there as I did when I was flying to Austin, Texas for Formula One. It was an absolute nightmare just trying to drive through the airport to get to International Departures, let alone find parking. This brings me to my first tip when it comes to flying out of YVR.

Reserve Long Term Parking in Advance.

The parkades were completely full for long term parking, yet they didn’t have any signs or workers to let people know, leading to people having to pay $5 just to exit a parking garage that they were in for maybe five minutes due to the fact that there was no parking. The jetSet is reserved for people who have a reservation to park there…lot refused to let anyone park in their long term parking if they didn’t have a reservation, flight details, and a credit card.  This means that if the driver had already dropped off their family and didn’t have that information on them, they were out of luck. Once we tracked down employees of YVR we discovered that jetSet parking not only requires a reservation, but that they are supposed to have empty spots for people who showed up the day of. Luckily, my family was able to get valet parking (for double the price), but the lack of communication from YVR was not worth the stress. So, either reserve long-term parking some weeks in advance or cough up the extra money for valet parking that ended up being so easy that we should have just done it in the first place.

Don’t just put liquids into a bag, but use YVR’s special 1L bags they only provide at security

Having flown internationally many times before, separating liquids into their own bags and making sure everything is under the maximum amount is standard routine. What was not routine was having to exit the security line to separate the liquids even further into YVR’s 1 litre bags (that they don’t provide in advance). Instead of simply being able to do that after being given the bags, we were escorted out and had to repack our skin and hair care products into the 3 bags (one for each family member) we were given and then put into our separate carry ons. Luckily, we made it work. As soon as we made it through security the second time, we were told very conflicting information about what was considered a liquid (deodorant is one according to the first security guard, but the second one didn’t even care that my mom had packed razors)..If they are going to require a specific 1L bag, then they should have to give it to customers earlier than after having gone through security. 

Finding parking, and now dealing with the liquid bags caused much more stress than they should have. All I wanted to do was make it to Texas and watch cars go fast around a track for the weekend. In the end, we made it, and flying back to Canada from the States has never been smoother. There was no comment about liquids having to be separated; I didn’t even have to pull my laptop out of my backpack when it went through security. I think that YVR could stand to learn a thing or two about airport management from our southern neighbours.

Paige has been with Her Campus since September of 2022 as both a writer and editor before deciding to take on a larger role as Chapter Leader for one year. As a former Campus Correspondents at the Her Campus at UVic chapter, Paige published content, managed the executive team, oversaw retention and recruitment, and hosted meetings, now she is back to simply writing and editing, what she truly enjoys. She has published a piece with the campus newspaper before deciding that she preferred to edit and publish articles instead. She has done media for a non-profit as well as collabing with local newspapers to promote the festival that the non-profit ran. As a fourth-year writing major at UVic, Paige is minoring in journalism with a focus in creative nonfiction. She received a scholarship for a short story she wrote in 2020. She has also received various academic scholarships for her grades. She hopes to go into either publishing/editing or working for a newspaper/magazine somewhere in Europe one day, ideally in the world of Formula One. In her free time, Paige watches and keeps up with the Formula One world. She also enjoys reading a good book, bingeing one of her favourite TV shows such as Criminal Minds, and visiting bookstores.