The Transformation Issue | Idealog.co.nz
094
S
ome people believe to look into the future of a city,
you need to look at its airport.
Across the world, airports have turned from
‘non-places’ – indifferent factories focused on processing
passengers – into cities themselves. They have become
cultural vehicles, emblems of wider urban landscapes, and
in some cases visions of technological change.
The development of airports has also reshaped the
role of the architect. In today’s age, urban designers
are tasked with building a meeting place of mobility,
experience, beauty, culture, retail interests, technological
change, and the environment.
Although many airports across the world still have
no sense of place and have been likened to malls and
supermarkets, they are slowly becoming symbols of a
regional or national typography.
CityLab recently reviewed the airport in Indianapolis,
for example, which has turned its airport into an authentic,
pleasant public space for people to linger and spend time
in – more like a museum or an art gallery rather than
a thoroughfare.
Subsequently, as airports turn into city plazas (which
in some cases feature yoga studios, dedicated green spaces
and even butterfly gardens) travellers have altered their
patterns of behaviour. People now spend more time in
airports, partly because of tightened security measures
since 9/11, but also because architects and planners have
turned them into lively commercial city spaces.
Perhaps, in coming time, people will arrive early to
airports, enjoy the retail offerings, interactive technologies,
public art, or food offerings, rather than scuttle through the
mass transit zone.
Auckland Airport has grappled with balancing
expanding its infrastructure with the customer experience
as passenger growth has surged ahead in recent years. But
the idea that airports are destinations in their own right is
one Auckland Airport hopes to deliver with its Departure
experience redesign – a process that has been 10 years in
the making.
To do so, it has examined the passenger journey.
Gensler’s MacKenzie explains, for example, the tension
between the airport needing to function for the efficient
traveller who wants to get straight through the terminal,
but also for the enjoyment seeker who is inclined to engage
in something interesting and different.
Moyes reiterates the need to meet the demands
of different types of travellers: “As a traveller, there are
moments when you are extremely happy and engaged
with the process and there are moments that people are
typically quite nervous.
“The queue is too long to get through security or
handing over the passport to get your face scanned.
Depending on the type of traveller, those can be very
stressful or very easy processes. So, one of the key
opportunities was to completely reshape that experience
for Auckland Airport, so that passenger journey was an
exemplar at an international level, not just in New Zealand,
but on a global stage.”If you build it, they will come
One of the practical considerations the airport is building
for is the rising number of international travellers. The
Auckland Airport predicts 10 million passengers will pass
through the international terminal each year.
To meet the demands of extra people, it has upgraded
the international departure area to be comprised into
three districts: a reconfigured landside farewell area, a
new emigration hall, and a new retail hub and passenger
lounge. It will double the span of the dwell area, increasing
the duty-free area from 6,000 to 12,000 square metres.
Additionally, the project deals with what Moyes calls,
“the legacy projects that have been happening over the past
three decades”.
These legacy projects include a number of
transmutations to the original design of the airport
from 1977. The project delivers 35,000 square metres of
combined new and renovated building floorplates to either
replace or reshape the existing fabric of the airport.
A key focus was to allow flexibility for the airport to
expand further in the future – to account for accelerated
population growth and technological change.
Rather than simply demolish and replace old legacy
niggles, both Jasmax and Gensler have repurposed qualities
of the original airport to combine with its modern features.
For example, a heavy-duty laminated timber flooring
system was used to raise the floor level by 1700mm, plus
two major plant rooms on levels two and three are new
features of the terminal development.
It hasn’t been easy, according to Moyes, who outlines
old design remnants that have been hidden in the airport,
including areas in the existing terminal that had slabs at
differing levels. He says the team looked to simplify and
standardise the terminal.Opening the cultural gateway
Another key feature is the renewed public artworks
displayed in the departure lounge of the international
terminal. The artist committed to the revival is Dr. Johnson
Witehira, whose artworks will describe Aotearoa’s multi-
cultural identity to the millions of visitors who enter our
country, but also to local people who return home.
MacKenzie says, “The overarching design narrative,
‘a journey through New Zealand from the Sea to the Sky’,
allows us to look at the various spaces along the route
and brings them back to a moment in that journey. It also
allows us to connect with local people, local landscapes,
and local design ideas like Johnson who has taken stories
shared by local iwi and been able to weave those into the
architecture.”
Witehira is a designer of Tamahaki (Ngati Hinekura),
Nga Puhi (Ngai-tu-te-auru), Ngati Haua and New Zealand
European descent. But his artwork also carries the voice of
three different mana whenua groups, Te Akitai-Waiohua,
Te Kawerau and Te Ahiwaru, who were closely involved
in the project. He has reached acclaim for his large-scale
installations of public art, projecting Maori voice in public
places across the globe, including in Times Square, NewThe overarching
design narrative,
‘a journey through
New Zealand from
the Sea to the Sky’,
allows us to look at
the various spaces
along the route and
brings them back
to a moment in
that journey. It also
allows us to connect
with local people,
local landscapes, and
local design ideas
like Johnson who has
taken stories shared
by local iwi and been
able to weave those
into the architecture.