Delta Airlines is testing Parallel Reality

We have all seen those large signs at airports where you have to look up your flight number based on your departure time, then follow the entire row to the right to find your gate number and see whether your flight may be delayed. In front of those signs there is usually is a large group of people, crammed together, peering and pointing, getting their boarding passes out of their pockets to see what exactly their flight number is.

Delta Airlines may have found a solution to this problem. Since last summer, Delta Airlines has been testing “Parallel Reality” signs at Detroit’s Metro Airport. Travelers participating in this test are personally welcomed by these signs and can see all the information they need at a glance: flight number, departure time, their gate and how long it takes to walk to that gate.

Because the signs use pixels that can project millions of individual beams of light to the eyes of individual passengers, passengers can only see their own information, thus maintaining their privacy. This way, passengers standing next to each other and looking at the same board see, parallel to each other, only their own reality: their name and (flight)details. Hence the name: “Parallel Reality.”

With this technology, Delta hopes to make the entire airport experience “Walking Speed” in the near future: Passengers are automatically identified with Digital ID, get all their information through Parallel Reality and don’t have to do anything but move hands-free at their own walking speed to their gate.

Read more about Parallel Reality, Digital ID and Walking Speed here.