A trip to see a newborn child. A journey to bury a loved one. A new start. A long-awaited arrival. A farewell. A reunion.
These are big moments in anyone's life. And in our age, like as not they often take place at airports, where we erect large municipal buildings to make use of the magic of flight to come and go.
So shouldn't the buildings that make up these airports reflect an awareness of this? Shouldn't the structures be a suitable setting for some of life's big moments? And shouldn't architects and designers be doing it in a way that celebrates the act of flight, something that humans dreamed about for eons until achieving it barely a century ago?
I think so. Just like cathedrals of the middle ages were important centers of human experience in their time, so too do I think airline terminals are the settings of important moments for us today. In addition, they also serve as the first impression many people have when arriving in a city or region.
Just as New York City's original Pennsylvania Station was designed as a monumental gateway to a great city (and as a testament to the power and ambitions of the Pennsylvania Railroad), an airline terminal will color a visitor's idea of a community at the all-important first impression stage.
And because every community of consequence has an airport, the terminals and concourses are ways for travelers to compare. They form natural stages where cities can put their best foot forward, distinguish themselves and say how they're different, how they're special, what they offer and what the collective hopes of its people are.
However, in a climate of budget constraints and lack of public funding and tough airline economics, too often a community must make do with an airport that's barely adequate: a place that may be an efficient in moving people, but does nothing to move the spirit.
And where opportunities to design new facilities come up, architects too often seem to go with a herd mentality that seems to make new airports all look and feel the same. In March 2011, I travelled from Terminal 8 at New York's JFK airport through Brussels and then to Delhi, India, all new facilities, and often it would be hard to guess where you were, or even that you were in an airport.
This is too bad, because I think airline terminals really do function as the cathedrals of our time: large structures with an important purpose, and which ought to say something about our aspirations as a people in our age, which surely transcend efficiency and surface glitz. That's why I started writing about them.
I hope they help others understand how important these buildings can be, and also how easy it can be to mess them up. To see how, check out my "How to Mess Up An Airport" page.
