Airport Terminals

188 Pages·1991·29.159 MB·English

by  Christopher J. Blow (Auth.)

Airport Terminals
Christopher J. Blow
MA(London) RIBA
Butterworth-Heinemann Ltd
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First published 1991
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British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
Blow, Christopher J.
Airport terminals.
I. Title
725
ISBN 0 7506 1278 9
Library of Congress Cataloguing in Publication Data
Blow, Christopher J.
Airport terminals : Christopher J. Blow
p. cm. — (Butterworth Architecture library of planning and
design)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 0 7506 1278 9
1. Airport terminals. I. Title. II. Series
NA6300.B56 1991
725'.39—dc20 91-19005
CIP
Composition by Genesis Typesetting, Laser Quay, Rochester, Kent
Printed and bound in Great Britain by M & A Thomson Litho Ltd.
East Kilbride, Scotland
Acknowledgements
The author acknowledges help and encouragement from Professor Norman Ashford
the following: Geoff Muirhead (Manchester Airport PLC)
Architects and representatives of airport authorities (for Brian Salterand Brian Finch (Heathrow Airport Ltd.)
visits and illustrations - note that permission to and, at Scott Brownrigg & Turner, my colleagues David
reproduce drawings and photographs has been Aplin, Pat Barker and Caroline Colmerand my
sought from the copyright holders in all cases). secretary Mary Pennell as well as my patient partners
Maurice Hudson and my wife Sheila.
Godfrey Crook
Christopher J. Blow 1990
viii
Preface
The significance of airport terminals, and the politics When we think about the activities in an international
of design airport terminal, the comparison with a railway station
breaks down. International travel, which accounts for the
In this age, as in the age of steam, long distance travel is majority of air travel (although the world's total figures are
a special experience. Arrivals and departures are distorted by enormous volumes of domestic travel in the
events, and points of arrival and departure are assembly USA), involves border controls on customs and
places for large numbers of people. immigration. These processes, when combined with
The real difference is in our perception of distance. A those relating to passengers' baggage - international
journey to another continent is both as adventurous and travel involves stays of such duration that significant
as unadventurous as a journey to another city might be. volumes of baggage are carried and need to be stowed
In other words, within a hundred years a long distance in the hold of the aircraft - involve delay and
train journey has been replaced as a scalar human centralization. The distances which passengers have to
activity by a long distance flight. travel inside airport terminals mean that some
Furthermore, really long distance personal travel by passengers may be forgiven for thinking that it is for the
any other means than by air is a thing of the past. It is benefit of the staff concerned with these processes that
well-nigh impossible to travel by public transport around the terminal is organized rather than for them.
the surface of the globe, as was proved by the British One of the principal anomalies about airport terminals
Broadcasting Corporation. In 1988 the BBC sent Michael is that they are usually provided by airport authorities
Palin 'Around the world in 80 days' accompanied by a rather than airlines. This is coming to be of enormous
television camera crew to emulate the fictional journey concern to the airlines, increasingly keen to offer their
taken 115 years earlier by Phileas Fogg. Since that passengers a distinctive service in a competitive market.
famous journey was made without aircraft, the BBC set As Lord King of British Airways said when launching BA's
out to see if it was still possible and only proved that half-year figures on 15 November 1988, 'If you have your
aircraft have largely replaced the ocean liner. own terminal and are responsible for it, you can give a
As a statement of the spirit of the age, a Victorian much better service. It's not too bad for passengers once
railway terminus has been replaced by an international the aircraft doors close and they're inside, but there are
airport terminal. problems getting there.'
\1«
P. 1. Heathrow Terminal 4, close-ups of
external aluminium cladding, Architects:
Scott Brown rigg and Turner, Guild ford.
I G ^ ^L Client: Heathrow Airport Ltd (part of BAA
Pic)
ix
Preface x
P.2. Heathrow Terminal 4, aluminium internal cladding P. 3. Chicago O 'Hare United Airlines Terminal, passenger tunnel and
departures concourse. PA. Architects: Murphy and Jahn, New York
Furthermore, he was predicting a 50% increase over
the next ten years in the number of passengers per BA
aircraft, with consequent demands on the passenger
handling side of the airport terminal.
The overriding themes of this book are capacity, and
the future of airport terminals. It is predicted that the
number of scheduled airline passengers will double in
the twelve years between 1988 and 2000 to over 2 billion.
This traffic will be met not so much by new airports as by
new terminals, replacement terminals and expanded
terminals. $100 billion is likely to be spent worldwide in
the next decade. This may seem a large sum until it is
remembered that just one new airport on an artificial
island in Japan's Osaka Bay is costing $6 billion alone.
Although the last new US airport to be built was Dallas/
Fort Worth in 1974, there are now several new ones on
the drawing board in readiness for the 1990s: Europe will
for certain gain only one new airport, Munich 2 (see
Chapter 12), before the year 2000, although new sites
are being considered outside Lisbon and Athens. A new
site outside Oslo was being considered but has been
effectively cancelled.
In the the USA, work has started in Denver for
completion in the mid 1990s and Texas may see a new
airport joining Dallas/Fort Worth at Austin. With little
activity in new airports in Latin America, the Middle East
and Africa, it is in the Pacific rim, where one third of the
world's economic activity in the next decade is seen as
being concentrated, that new airports are certain or
projected, at Sydney, Hong Kong, Macau, Kansai (see
also Chapter 2) and possibly others in Japan, the
Philippines and Thailand. Further reading
Nevertheless, new terminals and redeveloped old
ones will be the order of the decade. Blacklock, M. (1990) (ed) 1991 World Development
Architectural quality is demonstrated by terminal Survey. Airports International, December 1990
buildings: they represent the spirit of the aviation age in Donne, M. (1989) Cleared for Take-off. British Airways
their form and external and internal detail. Business Life, 24, December 89/January 90
Preface xi
P.5. London Stansted, model (airside) and interior, P.6. Architects
Foster Associates, London. Photographer: Richard Davies. Client:
Stansted Airport Ltd
P. 7. Kansai, terminal, Osaka, interior. Architects: Renzo Piano,
Genoa. Engineers: Owe Arup Partnership, London
1 An overview of airport terminals
1.1 Pressures on design: demands on designers to Density of traffic
innovate
As more and more passengers pace the floors of the
world's airport terminals, operators seek efficiency in use
of space. The prime manifestation of this is the fact that
There are five sources of demand which combine to density of traffic now justifies one-way passenger flows,
make the airport terminal of the early 1990s a very segregation and clarity of passenger movement.
different animal from its predecessor. The term 'animal' is Sustained peak hourly flows of the order of 3000
not inappropriate, for the shapes of terminals, piers and passengers call for a very different type of circulation
satellites now evolving would do credit to a bioscientist's design, with moving pavements and wide concourses.
taxonomy. Disabled people are travelling much more, and facilities
Security, density, commerce, airline traffic patterns are to be provided to make this possible. Where changes
and government controls are the five factors which of level are inevitable, ramps, and downwards only
combine to tax a designer's ingenuity. ramps at that, are preferable to lifts for large flows of
passengers.
Security
Commerce
Since recent terrorist atrocities have demonstrated the
need to check rigorously for dangerous substances in Airport terminals, for the reasons already outlined and as
baggage, check-in procedures are having to allow for illustrated by the new generation of buildings such as
the immediate X-ray of baggage or even more sophisti­ Gatwick North, opened in 1988, are shopping centres
cated electronic checks. Thermal neutron analysers and places of entertainment as well as large scale public
(TNAs) costing about $1 million each were being catering facilities. Fashions change, and these commer­
installed in US airports in 1990. The TNA system emits cial facilities need to be responsive to the speed of such
low energy neutrons around the item of baggage which change.
will interact with any explosives present and sound the Within the complex airside and landside circulation
alarm if any offending gamma rays are detected. Bulky systems of an international airport terminal, provision
new equipment and the circulating baggage belts to must be made for goods delivery routes and storage, in
feed it make special space demands in the check-in such a way that facilities can grow and change. The
area. advent of fast food chains in the high street has been
Furthermore, passenger and hand-baggage search­ followed by fast food for airline passengers. When
ing and segregation have taken on additional import­ establishing a new chain of orange juice and health food
ance. Effective segregation of arriving and departing outlets, Grand Metropolitan Hotels (under the brand
passengers on the landside of terminal buildings has Healthworks) used Heathrow and Gatwick airports as its
long been provided by designing-in ground level arrivals launching pad, with 10 out of 19 stalls there in the first
forecourts and elevated departures forecourts. Only with wave. With or without duty-free shops, airport con­
the advent of airside concourse structures which courses are established as merchandising centres,
segregate arriving from departing passengers can the Figure 1.3.
benefits of centralized security control of departing
passengers be achieved. Airline traffic patterns
Segregation of passengers in multi-level systems
needs to be complemented by controlled routes, for Some variability and diversity in traffic can be catered for
example for transfer passengers entering the secure in terminal design and some requires specific design
airside departures concourse. This situation is arising features. Terminal buildings need to be able to serve
more and more, especially as airports acquire multiple different aircraft sizes, and with the advent of the Boeing
terminals between which airside passenger transfers 747-400 in 1989 the range of sizes increased further.
take place, Figures 1.1, 2. Linear parking patterns with relocatable gate positions
2
An overview of airport terminals 3
1.1. London Heathrow Terminal 4 airside concourse, Architects Scott
Brownrigg & Turner, Guildford. Client: Heathrow Airport Ltd
r-m. <A RRIVALS ccmmoon ' ! SECURITY
r
icr"" r "!-""*• IB
■^.J|3|§i
/.. , i ,; *
^fi#*"- d- ill^ailippa^
ARRIVALS BAGGA^' ^ J, BAGGAGE RECLAIM
1.2. Bahrain International airside concourse, Architects: Scott
Brownrigg & Turner, Guildford, with Scott Wilson Kirkpatrick & Partners.
Client: Government of Bahrain
Terminal design principles 4
and a choice of aircraft centrelines, or both, are the order
of the day. The provision of apron-drive loading bridges
offers apron planning and operational flexibility which
complements the desired flexibility of the internal
organisation of the terminal building itself, Figure 1.4.
Transfer traffic cycles also affect the demands on
layout, as demonstrated by the newly evolving 'hubs'. A
terminal designed predominantly for transfer traffic within
itself requires concentrated airside facilities and circula­
tion in order to achieve the short interchange times which
airline marketing and passengers both need. Vast
though they may be, such US domestic transfer hubs as
Atlanta, Georgia are very different from transfer hubs
involving mixed domestic and international traffic.
The multiplicity of secure holding areas and circulation
routes involved in a mixed hub are illustrated by the
1.3. Manchester, Terminal 2 departures landside concourse view,
artist: John Robinson. Architects: Scott Brownrigg & Turner, Guildford. schematic design for Birmingham International Airport.
Client: Manchester Airport pic Two-level circulation routes have been adopted for
1.4. Birmingham International, Euro-hub terminal, schematic
passenger routes: feasibility study 1988. Architects: Scott Brownrigg &
Turner, Guildford with Scott Wilson Kirkpatrick & Partners
An overview of airport terminals 5
domestic and international/European Community post- on the airside, Figures 1.7, 2.5. Now, thanks to a
1992 traffic in lieu of arrivals and departures. This allows combination of good siting and rethinking of surrounding
passenger routes to complement airline operational land uses, the building is the centrepoint of a very
patterns, by which aircraft may come in as domestic different set of facilities. Those for arriving passengers
flights and go out as international flights from the same have been removed to a separate building next door and
stand, and vice versa. a multi-storey car park built in front. A whole series of pier
structures have thrust out on the airside, encroaching
Government controls upon the original alignment of one of Heathrow's three
redundant runways. As a final transformation, the
The politics of international travel have their effect on landside portion of the building was in 1989 gutted down
terminal design flexibility. The distinction between to the bare steel skeleton for the insertion of a completely
domestic and international traffic at European airports new check-in configuration with shopping and catering
will change dramatically in the European Community facilities: see Chapter 27. The important thing is that it
after 1992. Most terminal buildings presently handling has been possible to keep the landside space and the
European and non-European international traffic will be airside space in balance; but for how much longer?
unable to divide into dual terminals with European traffic
segregated from non-European.
Even without increase in traffic, extra space will be
needed for dual facilities and functions. This will prove in 1.3 Progress
some cases to be the severest test of the robustness and
flexibility of the design concepts evolved in the 1970s What began as an interchange point for airline passen­
and 1980s. The feature on Schiphol Airport (Amsterdam) gers is already becoming a great deal more. Just as
in Chapter 4 illustrates one airport authority's plan. Victorian railway termini and railway junctions spawned
hotels and shops and even whole industrial towns, so the
airport, and particularly its terminal areas and associated
1.2 The balancing act transport interchange points becomes a growth point for
all sorts of other activity.
Experience over the last three decades shows that some While concentrating on the form and content of
terminal designs and airport planning concepts have terminal buildings, this book also puts them in context. To
adapted to change and others have not. Going even start, then, within a historical context, it is interesting that
further back to pre-war days, the circular beehive although airport terminals have only existed since the
terminal at the original Gatwick Airport was all too soon mid 1920s, we have actually had replacement airport
obsolete. Quite apart from its siting, the small circular terminals since the 1930s. Commercial flying started
terminal, apparently ideal for nose-in parking and immediately after the First World War and terminal
extremely short walking distances in 1936, was totally facilities improved rapidly. Although a wooden hut made
unsuited to the needs of the larger aircraft which so an acceptable terminal in 1919, by 1925 passengers
rapidly replaced the DH86 biplane. Few, if any, pre-war were coming to expect a building with facilities not unlike
terminal buildings serve present needs or have even those of a railway terminus. Berlin, Paris (Le Bourget),
retained their function through many cycles of change Amsterdam and Croydon (London's international airport
and reconstruction. at that time, where the terminal opened on 30 January
Two notable British examples illustrate the sheer 1928), all offered waiting rooms and bureaux de change.
robustness of post-war adaptable design: The reputations of airlines were soon linked to the
airports: airlines were already competing against surface
London Gatwick, South Terminal transport and airports were in fact competing against
railway stations. Thus began the constant process of
Over a period of thirty years this terminal has been improvement and replacement of airport terminals. At Le
expanded on three sides and its original finger piers Bourget the original buildings were pulled down and
replaced, in one case by a circular satellite not dissimilar replaced in 1936, whereas Amsterdam (Schiphol) and
from the original 1936 beehive on a distant site. The Croydon improved and modernised. Passenger num­
building still straddles the London-Brighton road, long bers were still small and in the late 1930s Croydon and
since virtually replaced by a motorway well to the east. Le Bourget only handled about 2000 passengers each
The original forecourt for vehicular set-down and pick-up day.
has also long since been transposed to the other side of For London, Gatwick (see Chapter 3) and Croydon did
the railway line and linked with multi-storey short-term car not meet post-war needs. After a short period of glory as
parks and a hotel, Figures 1.5, 6. London's international airport, Hum, near Bournemouth,
was replaced by the former RAF field at Heathrow.
London Heathrow, Terminal 3 Departures Building Heathrow's life as a civilian airport began on 31 May
1946. In the first six months the number of aircraft
This terminal started life over thirty years ago as the movements and passengers were 2000 and 63 000
Heathrow Oceanic Terminal for both arriving and respectively. By 1950, these figures had risen to 38 000
departing passengers, with ground level parking at the and 523 000 in the whole year. The growth of Heathrow
front door on the landside and only an open apron strip Airport is featured in Chapter 4.