Another 'lunch ‘n‘ learn' today at CABE and this time Maurits Schaafsma was talking about the spatio-economic vision for the Schiphol region of Holland… Maurits is a Strategic Urban Planner at Schiphol Group, responsible for spatial planning, urban design, architecture and concept development… so not so surprisingly his talk was mainly based around the growth of Schipol airport from its birth just before the 1920’s to the present day.
Truth be known the presentation itself was a little ‘flat'… and having eaten a number of sandwiches the post-lunch slump started to kick in. I was hoping for some insights into cutting edge airport urban design and management – and whilst I got wind of ‘tangential runway systems’ and the spatial aspects of an ‘airport city’ it was the Q&A afterwards that proved to be most thoughtful.
Someone raised the matter of the neutral images of airports… how essentially each one looks like any other no-matter where in the world you are… and that perhaps there is a way to move forward in the development of these very busy public spaces in reflecting the locality or nationality of where they are. Which is a good point.
So there I was thinking: ‘what does make a good airport’? Well essentially, if a BBC article on Heathrow Terminal 5 is any guide, there are 5 key things:
- design
- signage
- retail
- transport
- no queues
Ok, it was quite a crude article but some starting points none-the-less. Conversely a blogger of sorts also on the BBC posted a rather funny guide to what doesn’t make for good airports. Obviously a grumpy traveller.
A little more googling and it turns out there is some impressive and exciting stuff on the horizon… in particular designboom.com offer these fine examples:
Incheon international airport, transportation centre, South Korea:
Carrasco international airport expansion, Uruguay:
Bangkok international airport, Thailand
Beijing international airport, China
Impressive and iconic stuff (interesting that 3 of them are in the far-east) - but I wonder how effective they will be in promoting a sense of 'national identity' in welcoming visitors... and how they will work as successful international transport hubs... time will tell...
At least they certainly beat more ‘quaint’ examples:
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