Yes, there used to be a "back-door" security mini-checkpoint into the C Terminal, which is dedicated exclusively to Southwest Airlines, McCarran International Airport's largest carrier.
It required about a quarter-mile walk, part of it outside, but it avoided the long line-ups and circus atmosphere at the C Terminal security checkpoint. From the curb at the departure drop-off point at Southwest, you walked directly under the tram tracks to a small door on the ground floor of the terminal, where it used to take one minute flat to pass through. From there, you took an escalator up to the gates.
It was a great little play, but it lasted less than two years in 2003 and part of 2004, while the federal Transportation Security Administration got its act together, slowly, at McCarran. In Summer 2004, the TSA added nearly 100 more security screeners and a number of new security-checkpoint lanes to reduce the crush of crowds at all four terminals, but especially C Terminal, and the back-door entrance was closed.
