Hilton Hotels & Resorts will host a booth at O’Hare International Airport this weekend to help passengers apply for and renew passports.
The initiative is part of the Hilton Passport Project — a bid to get people traveling (and, presumably, staying at Hilton properties).
The effort also includes a potential secondary benefit for Illinois residents, since passports are compliant with the Real ID Act, the program intended to tighten security standards for state-issued identification. As things stand, Illinois-issued driver’s licenses and ID cards will be acceptable forms of identification to get through airport security (and enter military buildings) only until Jan. 22, when an extension for complying with the federal act expires.
Over the years, several states, including Illinois, have been given more time to get on board with Real IDs. Illinois secretary of state spokesman Henry Haupt said Illinois has applied for another one-year extension — and anticipates this one will be the last.
“Illinois is currently 90 percent Real ID compliant, and (the Department of Homeland Security) has indicated the state will reach full compliance sometime next year, well before the federal deadline of late 2020,” Haupt said by email. The state’s goal, he added, is to have protocols that are fully compliant by the end of next year, at which point, Illinois will begin issuing Real ID cards in January 2019.
Of course, there are other reasons to have a passport: like seeing the world.
Stuart Foster, Hilton’s vice president of global brand marketing, said by email that the chain’s passport program, launched this past summer, is “rooted in a core belief: We don’t consider ourselves a hotel company — Hilton is a hospitality company. Every day we see the profound impact travel has on our guests’ lives, and for many, passports are the first step in making travel possible.”
Roughly 40 percent of the U.S. population has a valid passport, according to the federal government.
At the O’Hare passport booth, travelers will be able to fill out passport applications, ask questions of a U.S. State Department representative, take passport photos (free of charge) and — of course — hear about Hilton’s global properties.
The booth will operate at Terminal 3 (past the security check point), 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Friday and 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday and Sunday.
Hilton will subsequently offer a similar service in San Francisco (Nov. 2-4) and Cleveland (Nov. 9-11).
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