Airport in New Zealand imposed a three-minute limit on goodbye hugs.
Specifically, a sign at Dunedin Airport in New Zealand says: “Maximum hug time 3 minutes. For a warmer farewell, use the parking lot.”
This limit caused many reactions.
“A 20 second hug is enough”
Dunedin Airport CEO Daniel De Bono weighed in on the matter in an interview with New Zealand radio station RNZ. Describing airports as “emotional hotbeds,” he pointed to a study that suggests a 20 second hug is enough to get a burst of the “love hormone” oxytocin and argued that moving customers quickly allows more people to get more hugs. “We were accused of violating basic human rights and how dare we limit the duration of someone’s hug,” the CEO told the Associated Press news agency.
The Dunedin Airport car park, where De Bono admits that “our team has seen interesting things happen… over the years”, offers a free 15-minute visit.
The limit is intended to replace measures used at other airportswhich warn with tightening of wheels or fines for drivers who park in arrivals areas. Some airports in the UK charge fees for all landings, no matter how short.
De Bono said Dunedin Airport – a small terminal serving a city of 135,000 people on New Zealand’s South Island – took the “idiosyncratic” route.
Hug the police?
Three minutes is “enough time to stop, say goodbye to your loved ones and move on,” he said. “Timeout is actually a more polite way of saying: you know, go ahead”.
However, the new time limit will not be strictly enforced, other than instructing people to move to the car park.
“We don’t have police back,” De Bono said.