LAX’s Encounter restaurant gets top rating for airport hookups

Any bar, the gym, that new art gallery opening, your best friend’s wedding. These are all places proven to put you in cupid’s line of sight. But what about using your airport layover as a place to meet your next hookup?

The dating site MeetAtTheAirport.com surveyed 80,000 members and rated LAX as the No. 1 West Coast airport for romantic hookups. Yes, there is a dating site devoted to helping you find your soul mate, or at least a one-night-stand, at the airport.

The Encounter, the psychedelic, dome-shaped bar at the center of the LAX theme building, helped the airport earn its No. 1 hookup rating. No surprise there for an establishment with a name that literally means to meet unexpectedly.

Also noted in the survey were other LAX restaurants, including Pink’s Hot Dogs, Gladstone’s 4 Fish, L.A. Roadhouse Route 66, Malibu Al’s Beach Bar and Sam Adams’ Taste of L.A and eight Starbucks locations. Who hasn’t looked up from their Pink’s Polish Pastrami Hot Dog and found their soul mate staring back at them?

The website rated airports for hookup likeliness based on five criteria. First, the airport size was considered. The bigger the airport, the more chances for delays, which translates into time to mingle. Second, the number and quality of food options, bars, entertainment venues and social amenities were taken into consideration. That’s where LAX earned major points.

The survey also looked at the average Yelp ratings, what it calls “intangible considerations like extraordinary amenities or rare demographic groups,” and finally, its members’ responses to the question: Which airport do you feel has given you the best opportunity to meet strangers of the opposite sex?

Other airports that made the top five hookup list include Las Vegas McCarran International Airport, Reno-Tahoe International Airport, Honolulu International Airport and Santa Barbara Airport.

Who knows? Maybe the next time you order that vanilla latte, extra pump, at one of the eight LAX Starbucks locations, you’ll notice the person behind you in line staring lovingly, ordering the same thing.

Hey, want to share a luggage cart?

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