Redefining the future airport passenger experience through the journey of modern sports and entertainment facilities

Much like a stadium or arena where the cauldron of a sports event carries the jubilation of victory or the sadness of defeat through thousands of fans, an airport is essentially a place where we can design an emotional arc into people’s journeys. 

As the world’s leading sport and entertainment infrastructure designer, Populous knows intimately how to shape an experience through a building.  So, as our Asia Pacific Aviation team celebrates the opening of the redevelopment of Kansai International Airport’s Terminal 1 in Japan this month, after a five year staged renovation, our leadership team sat down for a Q&A with Populous Senior Principal – Director Brett Wightman who knows only too well how a building can influence every emotion.  

As Brett waited for his flight back to Singapore, he spoke to Mark Wolfe, Principal & Head of Aviation EMEA; Matt Findlay, Principal & Head of Aviation ANZ; and Ben Dawson, Principal & Head of Aviation Asia about their work to bring the joy in shared human moments to airport terminals across the APAC region.  

Q: Brett 

There are so many similarities but so many differences between sports infrastructure and airports.  As I’m sitting here waiting for my flight home, what immediately occurs to me is that airports have an audience as attentive as any rugby, baseball or soccer match.  How can that attention be directed to commercial opportunities, like we would encourage at a stadium or arena, where we have various activations for the home and away teams?   

A: Matt 

The typical airport passenger is similar in their movements to a fan entering a stadium to see their team perform.  If we take a business traveller, for example, they are likely to be purposeful in their movements, wanting to know where their gate is and when they need to be there.  It’s the same at a concert or football match.  It used to be – know where your row is and how long it’s going to take from there to the food and beverage outlet – but now, as you say, there are so many different types of experiences from premium suites to children’s activations, pre-game dinners and post-game entertainment.  In effect, what the sports industry has done is take what airports and airlines started with their lounge offerings and elevated this much further to keep people engaged and at the venue for longer.   

The stadium is a commercially-focused interactive experience – you have as much fun outside the bowl as you do in it, and for airports this should be the case with the gate.  Passengers should want to get to the airport early to get to their favourite restaurant before their flight or have a fantastic shopping experience with friends, meaning that the gate should not be their primary destination but should in fact be the last thing they should reach once they have experienced the many other exciting, relaxing and interesting opportunities that an airport terminal can provide. 

Q: Brett 

I think that idea of the experience is key to any sports event.  We create venues for everyone.  They are welcoming and accessible.  Are you seeing that airports are becoming less about the destination and more about the journey? 

A: Ben 

The interesting thing about airports is that they are becoming destinations in themselves.  Living in Singapore, I go to Changi Airport once a month to travel, and probably the same frequency just to eat and shop at the landside facilities. 

The airport should be a space for everyone.  If you don’t travel regularly, the journey through the airport terminal alone can be daunting.  They are often not designed to be child friendly or welcoming to senior citizens who may travel less regularly but probably feel the emotional strain even more.  Stadiums have segmented their audience over the past decade and looked at how different spaces can regulate the emotions of different groups, welcoming them into the space rather than exacerbating their potential nervousness or negativity. 

If we look at somewhere like CommBank Stadium in Australia, it was designed to welcome in local communities.  It has 360-degree access, expansive open concourses and thoughtfully designed accessible facilities for all age groups.  But more than that, it has a specific family seating zone with direct connections to a Kids’ Zone and nearby family activation areas. 

Imagine if we could activate spaces like this more in airport terminals to make them more welcoming and to provide a sense of ease for all passengers.  The terminal would therefore be the start of your journey rather than somewhere you sit while waiting to start your journey.   

Q: Brett 

Something we’ve been focusing on in the arena space for the past decade is adaptability and multipurpose venues.  If you look at The Venetian Arena in Macau where we completed a major upgrade and refurbishment in 2024, that venue can host a pre-season NBA game one night then a pop concert the next, followed by weekend markets or activities for kids.  Is there potential for airport terminals, which are similar in size and scale, to be more adaptable and do they actually need to be more flexible? 

A: Mark 

Yes there is potential for this.  We need differential thinking in the design community about what an airport terminal is.  Airport terminals serve multiple purposes outside of just their primary transport function.  It’s probably extreme to say that an airport terminal is going to be hosting a concert but it’s certainly within the realms of possibility that terminals can start to theme their experiences more and be increasingly event-based.  There is no reason why targeted activations aligned to groups of visitors or key dates in the local calendar couldn’t be held both inside and outside the terminal.   

Airports are in many ways extensions of the event experience, whether it’s people arriving to see their home team play a grand final or their favorite singer play to an international audience at a major stadium.  At Munich Airport, for example, Populous is designing the new indoor MUCcc Arena.  This will add to the region’s cultural offering, boosting tourism and injecting an estimated 285 million Euros annually into the local economy.  If you know you’ve got passengers from a particular country coming through the airport for a specific event like a concert or a sports match, then the terminal should be able to adapt to that theme and group of people. 

Q: Brett 

It has become much easier to digitally track the fan experience, particularly for league games where attendance at venues is often related to club membership.  This allows us to provide more personalised and tailored experiences during a game such as knowing where a fan’s preferred viewing position is or making sure they are seated near the food outlet they like to eat at.  Airlines have been doing this very well through their loyalty programs where they know their passengers’ preferences intimately but what about airports themselves? 

A: Matt 

I don’t think tracking the passenger experience has been implemented as well in airports as it has with fans in stadia or even with passengers in the airline lounge or on the aircraft.  That’s because this loyalty role has often been part of the core business of airlines, as you said, but airports are realising that there’s a huge opportunity here to personalise the passenger experience in the terminal and understand their visitors better.   

For our sports clients, Populous uses a tool that we have developed called VenueTwin that imports two-dimensional CAD files to create a fully-interactive, three-dimensional digital version of the venue.  Crowd flow, security exercises and other peak operational performance metrics can all be visualized digitally to ensure the smooth running of a large venue.  In an airport terminal context, this virtual venue experience enables easier planning, design collaboration and preparation for future events like weather-affected delays. 

But perhaps more importantly for the passenger experience, when you’re dealing with an audience of thousands in a live venue you have access to a huge amount of data.  Understanding how to analyze that data effectively can be very powerful in allowing you to gain a deeper understanding into the changing needs and habits of the people who visit an airport terminal, and ultimately in telling them a story that guides them to where they need to be. 

The Sphere in Las Vegas is an example of how multisensory capabilities push the possibilities of storytelling into completely new territory, taking visitors on a journey that bridges the gap between the digital and physical worlds and allows their concert experience to start way before the artist has taken to the stage. 

Q: Brett 

I was at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium in the UK recently.  Creating a sense of loyalty in your team through a building is one thing, but Tottenham takes this sense of place to a whole other level.  There’s a five-story Market Place within the venue that was just buzzing with fans carrying the pride of knowing they’re also supporting the local eateries that fill the space. Many of these are street-food-style venues, along with the on-site Beavertown microbrewery that brings the high street culture to the edge of the playing field.    

A: Ben 

I don’t think it’s difficult to reimagine this sense of place in an aviation context.  It may not be the same emotions that a home fan feels in their football team’s venue, but it can be the feelings created when exploring a new city and wanting to soak in that sense of place.  From material selection to wayfinding and importantly, ensuring that the best of the city is integrated into the offerings from the iconic local restaurants to themed retail opportunities.  It’s quite an intricate diagram to be able to understand these synergies between people, place and experience. 

I’m really looking forward to arriving at Kansai International Airport Terminal 1 as a passenger rather than one of the designers, when it fully opens on 27 March.  It will be a proud moment for me having worked on the project since 2017, but aside from that, I’ll be wanting to get a sense of how the airport tells me where I’ve arrived.  Too often, airports rely on material selection and design items to try and convey a sense of place, but I don’t think this is enough. For example, when visiting the wonderful city of Osaka, I can find an amazing array of restaurants, bars and retail outlets and yet often, these aren’t found in airports where the focus is global brands that you could find in most major cities. By bringing some of this local flavor into Kansai Airport, that sense of place is enhanced and touches additional senses such as taste, smell and noise – not just the aesthetic. In that way, you can see the adjacencies with sports infrastructure like Tottenham Hotspur Stadium that you mentioned earlier, which has local outlets and offers pop-up live local music events around the precinct.  

This was exactly how we felt after the opening of Clark International Airport in the Philippines.  Regarded as one of the world’s most beautiful airports, the terminal draws inspiration from the natural scenery.  We avoided using the neutral, beige palette of many airports around the world and selected a material palette with a vibrant colour and energy as reflected by the local people.  There are areas for exhibitions by local artists and flexible event spaces providing a fresh new experience each time passengers fly in and out.  The artwork has been created by the local community and acts as a visual beacon which can be seen from almost anywhere in the departures area, drawing passengers through the retail space and creating a stimulating place to linger, as well as engaging the local community through their participation in these activities and spaces. 

If you look at what stadiums were in the 1990s, they were engineering–led solutions.  Since then, they have been much more design–led and that has completely changed the commercial opportunities for owners and operators – elevating the user experience.  There’s a real opportunity in the aviation sector to design buildings that facilitate the experiences that are driven by the many different emotions we carry as passengers – promoting emotional connections and leaving behind emotional baggage.