A city ticket office (CTO), booking office, or city ticket counter is a retail office for an

airline An airline is a company that provides civil aviation, air transport services for traveling passengers and freight. Airlines use aircraft to supply these services and may form partnerships or Airline alliance, alliances with other airlines for ...

, essentially a

travel agency A travel agency is a private retailer or public service that provides travel and tourism-related services to the general public on behalf of accommodation or travel suppliers to offer different kinds of travelling packages for each destinatio ...

specializing in that particular carrier's flights. Until the 1990s, many major airlines had storefronts in luxury shopping districts. Today, few remain. When airlines used paper tickets, certain kinds of travel changes required in-person visits to these ticket offices to physically modify or exchange the ticket, but with the introduction of

electronic ticket An electronic ticket is a method of ticket entry, processing, and marketing for companies in the airline, railways and other transport and entertainment industries. Airline ticket E-tickets in the airline industry were devised in about 1994, and ...

s in 1994, their importance diminished and many were closed as passengers bought tickets over the internet instead. City ticket offices were formerly very common worldwide. Although they are still common in many parts of the world,John Ollila, "TBT: Airline City Ticket Offices!", ''LoyaltyLobby'
June 24, 2021
/ref> they have become rare in the United States.Barbara Peterson, "The Death of the Airline Ticket Office", ''

Condé Nast Traveler ''Condé Nast Traveler'' is a luxury and lifestyle travel magazine published by Condé Nast. The magazine has won 25 National Magazine Awards. The Condé Nast unit of Advance Publications purchased ''Signature'', a magazine for Diners Club memb ...

''
September 29, 2017
/ref> For example,

American Airlines American Airlines is a major airlines of the United States, major US-based airline headquartered in Fort Worth, Texas, within the Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex. It is the Largest airlines in the world, largest airline in the world when measured ...

once had 110, but by 2017, only three remained. A few US airlines still maintain multiple ticket offices: ,

Cape Air Hyannis Air Service Inc., operating as Cape Air, is an airline headquartered at Barnstable Municipal Airport in Hyannis, Massachusetts, United States. It operates scheduled passenger services in the Northeast (US), Northeast, the Caribbean, Midw ...

has 8. {{asof, 2007, the primary users of city ticket offices in the US were business travelers buying premium fares and recent immigrants, who often pay in cash. City ticket offices were often found on major luxury shopping streets such as

Regent Street Regent Street is a major shopping street in the West End of London. It is named after George, the Prince Regent (later George IV) and was laid out under the direction of the architect John Nash and James Burton. It runs from Waterloo Place ...

Fifth Avenue Fifth Avenue is a major and prominent thoroughfare in the borough of Manhattan in New York City. It stretches north from Washington Square Park in Greenwich Village to West 143rd Street in Harlem. It is one of the most expensive shopping stre ...

, the

Champs-Élysées The Avenue des Champs-Élysées (, ; ) is an avenue in the 8th arrondissement of Paris, France, long and wide, running between the Place de la Concorde in the east and the Place Charles de Gaulle in the west, where the Arc de Triomphe is lo ...

Union Square (San Francisco) Union Square is a public plaza bordered by Geary Street, Geary, Powell Street (San Francisco), Powell, Post and Stockton Street (San Francisco), Stockton Streets in downtown San Francisco, California. "Union Square" also refers to the central sh ...

Via Veneto Via Vittorio Veneto (), colloquially called Via Veneto, is one of the most famous, elegant, and expensive streets of Rome, Italy. The street is named after the Battle of Vittorio Veneto (1918), a decisive Italian victory of World War I. Federico F ...

, and

Wilshire Boulevard Wilshire Boulevard is a prominent boulevard in the Los Angeles area of Southern California, extending from Ocean Avenue in the city of Santa Monica east to Grand Avenue in the Financial District of downtown Los Angeles. One of the principal ...

, along with cruise line sales offices and

tourist office A visitor center or centre (see American and British English spelling differences), visitor information center, tourist information center, is a physical location that provides tourist information to visitors. Types of visitor center A visi ...

s; some were found inside luxury hotels. In New York City, airline ticket offices were concentrated on Fifth Avenue starting in the 1960s. In particular,

British Airways British Airways (BA) is the flag carrier airline of the United Kingdom. It is headquartered in London London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a populati ...

and

Japan Airlines , also known as JAL (''Jaru'') or , is an international airline and Japan's flag carrier and largest airline as of 2021 and 2022, headquartered in Shinagawa, Tokyo. Its main hubs are Tokyo's Narita International Airport and Haneda Airport, as w ...

were on Fifth Avenue, and

Air France Air France (; formally ''Société Air France, S.A.''), stylised as AIRFRANCE, is the flag carrier of France headquartered in Tremblay-en-France. It is a subsidiary of the Air France–KLM Group and a founding member of the SkyTeam global air ...

Air India Air India is the flag carrier airline of India, headquartered at New Delhi. It is owned by Talace Private Limited, a Special-Purpose Vehicle (SPV) of Tata Sons, after Air India Limited's former owner, the Government of India, completed the sa ...

, and

KLM KLM Royal Dutch Airlines, legally ''Koninklijke Luchtvaart Maatschappij N.V.'' (literal translation: Royal Aviation Company Plc.), is the flag carrier airline of the Netherlands. KLM is headquartered in Amstelveen, with its hub at nearby Amste ...

were all in

666 Fifth Avenue 660 Fifth Avenue (formerly 666 Fifth Avenue and the Tishman Building) is a 41-story office building on the west side of Fifth Avenue between 52nd and 53rd Streets in the Midtown Manhattan neighborhood of New York City. The office tower was ...

. As of 1977, many of the Fifth Avenue offices, notably

Delta Delta commonly refers to: * Delta (letter) (Δ or δ), a letter of the Greek alphabet * River delta, at a river mouth * D (NATO phonetic alphabet: "Delta") * Delta Air Lines, US * Delta variant of SARS-CoV-2 that causes COVID-19 Delta may also re ...

and

Air Canada Air Canada is the flag carrier and the largest airline of Canada by the size and passengers carried. Air Canada maintains its headquarters in the borough of Saint-Laurent, Montreal, Quebec. The airline, founded in 1937, provides scheduled and ...

, moved to

Madison Avenue Madison Avenue is a north-south avenue in the borough of Manhattan in New York City, United States, that carries northbound one-way traffic. It runs from Madison Square (at 23rd Street) to meet the southbound Harlem River Drive at 142nd Stre ...

.Carter B. Horsley, "Realty News", ''

New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...

'
Aug. 7, 1977
p. R1 In 1992, Air France moved to

125 West 55th Street 125 West 55th Street, also known as Avenue of the Americas Plaza, is a 23-story, office building located on 55th Street between the Avenue of the Americas (Sixth Avenue) and Seventh Avenue in Midtown Manhattan, New York City. The building al ...

.David W. Dunlap, "Commercial Property: 125 West 55th Street; The Anatomy of a Macklowe Tower Leasing Coup", ''

''
November 24, 1991
p. 10:12 The décor often included travel posters and model airplanes, as well as racks of brochures and schedules. Air India even included original artwork from India; the renowned artist

Shanti Dave Shanti Dave is an Indian painter and sculptor, considered by many as one of the major Indian artists of the twentieth century. He is a former member of the Lalit Kala Akademi and the Sahitya Kala Parishad. The Government of India awarded him th ...

painted murals at booking offices in the 1950's and 1960's, including in New York, Los Angeles, Rome, Sydney, and Perth.Gargi Gupta, "Distress sale?", ''Business Standard''
January 24, 2013
/ref>

Flag carrier A flag carrier is a transport company, such as an airline or shipping company, that, being locally registered in a given sovereign state, enjoys preferential rights or privileges accorded by the government for international operations. Hist ...

s' offices often promoted travel to their home country in general; some even sold souvenirs.

Notes

Airline tickets Travel agencies