Twenty-five years after the attacks that sealed the airport gate against all but ticketed passengers, the Transportation Security Administration is quietly reopening that threshold. In a pilot program at select airports, certain non-travelers may once again pass through security screening and accompany loved ones to the departure gate — a practice once ordinary, then unthinkable, now being reconsidered. The move reflects both a maturing confidence in layered security and a recognition that the human need to say a proper goodbye did not disappear when the rules changed. What the nation chooses