Oh, Philly: So much angst over picking up passengers arriving at the airport!

Those tickets for idling on I-95 shoulders and ramps that police started handing out this week after years of an admittedly ineffective "move-it-along" policy. The getting lost while trying to find the PennDot park-and-ride area on Bartram Avenue, which poses as a surrogate airport cell-phone lot. And all those unhelpful signs.

It doesn't have to be this way. And if you've spent time at spring training with the Phillies in Florida, you might already know that.

Because not too far from Clearwater, at Tampa International Airport, is what seems like passenger-pickup nirvana compared with this region's hassles.

Just inside the Tampa airport, right off the George J. Bean Parkway and one mile before you reach the main terminal, a 350-space lot welcomes motorists waiting for calls from arriving fliers.

"It's very simple," airport spokeswoman Brenda Geoghagan said. "You pull in and wait, kind of like going to the old drive-in theater."

Except, instead of a giant screen, there are two big electronic message boards that provide updated information on arriving flights. They also advise motorists to hold off heading for the pickup area for at least 15 minutes after a flight lands, to give passengers a chance to get off the plane and claim any checked luggage.

To kill time, those waiting can surf the Web. The free lot, open since November 2005, offers free WiFi service.

Got to go? There are bathrooms there, too, added about two years ago. Why? "Like every amenity we have," Geoghagan said, "it's listening to our customers."

They haven't yet committed to the latest request: a hot dog vendor. After all, Geoghagan said, "you're not meant to camp out there."

If you prefer not to go to the Tampa lot, you can park in any airport garage - the first hour is free.

Though not all are the kind of Shangri-La Tampa's strives to be, cell-phone lots are fast becoming the norm at airports throughout the country.

A couple of hours' drive south on I-95 from Philadelphia, BWI Marshall outside Baltimore has a free 50-space cell-phone lot across from one of the airport's main garages.

A "45-minute waiting area" is Denver International Airport's version of the cell-phone lot.

Even New York, known for its "just-deal-with-it" attitude, offers a cell-phone lot with more than 70 spaces on the premises of John F. Kennedy International Airport.

Tampa International officials visited airports "all over the country to analyze how they operated garages and curbside areas" before creating the cell-phone lot and offering free parking in its garages, Geoghagan said.

Before that, life on the parkway leading into the airport, and on the roads around the passenger terminals, was much like it was here until state police announced the start of their zero-tolerance ticket campaign Monday.

"We were getting complaints," Geoghagan said, mostly about traffic patrols forcing motorists who were waiting curbside to move.

Since implementing a "curbside-management program" featuring the cell-phone lot, "the complaints have definitely dropped," she said. Now, "we get thank yous."

Apparently feeling little pressure to match Tampa is Rina Cutler, who as Philadelphia's deputy mayor in charge of transportation issues, oversees the airport. When told yesterday of the features at Tampa's cell-phone lot, her response was pure Philly-tude:

"Good luck to Tampa. We're not looking to do anything fancy. We're just looking to have a safe, convenient location for people to wait."

As a means to that end, Cutler plans to convene a meeting of city, PennDot, and Federal Highway Administration officials (they have jurisdiction over signs posted on I-95) Sept. 14. Discussions are not likely to include creating an actual airport-operated cell-phone lot.

The PennDot park-and-ride lot a couple of miles from the airport on Bartram Avenue "just needs to be better publicized," Cutler said.

"It may be that we need to buy that lot," she added. "It may be that we need to change the dynamic of what exists."

In the meantime, yesterday the airport made changes to its Web site (www.phl.org) so that information on the Bartram Avenue lot - including directions and "an approximate address" for GPS purposes - is more noticeable.

"The park-and-ride icon is now flashing in black font," spokeswoman Phyllis VanIstendal said.

It's no movie-size screen with free Internet access and toilets. But it was "a revision that could be made really quickly," she said.

Contact staff writer Diane Mastrull at 215-854-2466 or dmastrull@phillynews.com.