As a destination, Boston's Logan International Airport has long been an object of dread. To land there is to be lost and confused amid a sprawling, crowded, poorly signed labyrinth where finding your luggage or your bus are largely matters of chance. To drive there is to be buffeted by every merciless cruelty of Boston traffic. Yet, the very relentless construction that's exacerbated these problems for the past decade is beginning to redeem itself. The new tunnels are less absurd than the old (though they still dump drivers into the change-a-lane millrace that connects terminals), and Logan's least hospitable corner, International Terminal E, shows signs of being that rarest of Massport installations -- dare we say it: a world-class facility.

The results of the $200 million Terminal E renovation, are, in fact, astonishingly uncharacteristic for a local public venue. The Cambridge-based Modern Continental construction company, which undertook the renovation in 1999, was forced to rebuild and expand Terminal E while it was still in use -- a situation that made both builders and travelers miserable. But all that's becoming just a bitter memory. Today, once an international passenger has mastered the art of parking within a day's walk of the pedestrian bridge between Terminal E and the expanded 3150-car central parking garage, the trek to international departures is downright pleasant. And the new departure-lounge surroundings -- conspicuous for the lack of plywood walkways and hanging sheets of dusty polyethylene -- are capacious, welcoming, well-appointed, and (this is key at Logan) difficult to get lost in.