VIENNA, April 20, 2012 /PRNewswire-Asia/ -- Woods Bagot is calling on the aviation industry to tighten its focus on individual passengers and less on broad demographic trends, as the global studio launches WARP Speed Mach I (WARP Speed) at Passenger Terminal World (PTW) 2012, in Vienna today.
Speaking at PTW, James Berry, Director, Transportation & Infrastructure at Woods Bagot said:
"The aviation industry is not sufficiently focused on the increasingly diverse range of flying passengers. Whilst demographic profiling is necessary to understand the broader preferences of cohorts, individual profiling will be critical to the success of future airport operations."
Furthermore, Woods Bagot believes that airports, as asset owners and managers, would find it advantageous to benchmark the priorities, wants, needs and aspirations of their tenants. We see this as industry nous; a commercial advantage for airport owners to ensure that their operations, processes, and infrastructure meet the future needs of the market," continued James.
With the above reflecting one of the recommendations that have taken flight from Woods Bagot's WARP Speed research paper, the full report interrogates the present, forecasts future trends, and questions the norm, across topic areas including the development of airport cities, future technology, the changing passenger experience, sustainable developments and industry collaboration.
"As architects, we inhabit a world that is continually looking forward to a better, more sustainable future; while at the same time understanding how to deliver in the reality of today. This process of future casting and then real-day application allows us to make incremental steps toward an improved world, and of course at times there are breakthroughs that allow us to make leaps forward," said James Berry.
The WARP Speed research work includes contributions from a diverse panel of Woods Bagot experts, and investigates the often tenuous relationship that exists between airports and their tenants - the airline carriers, retailers, control authorities and concessionaires with which they share both dependence and competition.
WARP Speed broaches the rising issue of collaboration - a buzz word in other industries but one that has yet to be embraced by the aviation sector. "We call on airports to revise their governance model to one that is shared and fair," said James. "Shared governance models transcend the management of day-to-day activities and broach longer-term strategic planning efforts that benefit all airport stakeholders."
Woods Bagot have been designing airport infrastructure for the last two decades, and with a growing portfolio of aviation projects and an operational platform that is underpinned by research, Woods Bagot's one global studio is proving to be a winning model, as they continue to strengthen and diversify their skills matrix globally.
Amidst fierce competition from some of the world's most admirable designers such as Zaha Hadid and Aeroports de Paris with Paul Andreu, Woods Bagot won the international competition for the China Southern Airport City - a 400 hectare mixed-use development set on the Liuxi River, in Guangzhou, China.
The design, which totals 41 million square feet (3.8 million square meters), expands the traditional corporate headquarters to an urban scale, blending business and manufacturing uses with lifestyle and residential components. This new active district will support China Southern Airlines' brand and continued leadership as Asia's largest airline.
Due to the growing portfolio of aviation projects, James Berry, has transitioned to Perth, as the global studio embarks on developing a centre of excellence in Australia, to deliver world class solutions for not only existing projects, yet to also respond to the substantial number of airport and rail projects planned across the Asia Pacific region.
WARP Speed Mach I reflects the beginning of the research journey, and an updated issue WARP Speed Mach II, is set to be released in due course.
About Woods Bagot
One of the world's leading architectural practices, Woods Bagot has a global team of 700 working across North America, Europe, Asia, Australia and the Middle East. The firm's unique "One Global Studio" philosophy drives unprecedented knowledge sharing and true collaboration across time zones, producing innovative, inspired and functional design solutions for our clients. Underpinning Woods Bagot's knowledge culture is Public, our propriety research brand, created in collaboration with leading thinkers and academics.
The firm's diverse portfolio of high-profile projects includes: 10 Trinity Square, 100 Bishopsgate, Qatar Science and Technology Park, Adelaide Convention Centre, Sydney University's Business School, The GPT Group (Sydney), Melbourne Convention and Exhibition Centre, Perth International Airport, St Regis Beach Resort (Abu Dhabi), and Shijiazhuang Exhibition and Convention Centre (China).
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