Introduction

An airport refers to any area of land or water designed, equipped, set apart or commonly used for
affording facilities for affording facilities for the landing and departure of aircraft and includes any area or
space, whether on the ground, on the roof of a building or elsewhere, which is designed, equipped or set
apart for affording facilities for the landing and departure of aircraft capable of descending or climbing
vertically.

Functional Design of the Airport Passenger Terminal

The passenger terminal must be designed to:

1. Facilitate the transition of passengers between surface and air modes of transportation
2. Provide a controlled and orderly environment for the processing and flow of passengers
3. Create a secure and comfortable environment for passengers to gather and wait, if necessary prior to
boarding the aircraft
4. Accommodate and facilitate all of the necessary and often complex work processes associated with
the operation and maintenance of the terminal facility
5. Interface with the various modes of transportation providing access to the airport.

GENERAL DESIGN CONSIDERATIONS

 Needless to say, passengers who may be carrying baggage should be offered such conveniences of design as automated doors,
sufficiently wide escalators, moving sidewalks, and similar devices. At all times the analysis of traffic flow, volume of passengers, and
direction of movement should be carefully considered.
Air traffic passengers rapidly cross international boundaries, and language problems must be anticipated. The International Air
Transport Association has given serious consideration to the language problem and has attempted to develop a series of glyphs which
can frequently be used in lieu of bilingual messages.
The terminal must also provide amenities for the traveling public. In fact, current trends are to make shopping part of the travel
experience, and some terminals have become akin to mini shopping malls. Amenities may include any of the following list and such
other items as may be determined by a particular locale:
1. Airline priority travel lounge
2. Bank
3. Barber shop
4. Camera shop
5. Candy store
6. Car rental agencies
7. Chapel
8. Clothing store 
9. Drug store
10. Duty-free shop
11. Employee snack bar and cafeteria
12. Flower shop
13. Gift shop
14. Haberdashery
15. Insurance vending
16. Money exchange
17. Newsstand
18. Observation deck
19. Parcel lockers
20. Restaurant, bar, and supplementary eating facilities
21. Shoe shine
22. Showers/dressing rooms
23. Telecommunication center
24. Television lounge Valet

Runway
The Runway Safety Area is the cleared, grassy area around the paved runway. It is kept free from any obstacles that
might impede flight or ground roll of aircraft, although the grass is not always necessarily in good condition. The
grass is often marked with white cones or gables.

The Runway is the surface from threshold to threshold, which typically features threshold markings, numbers,
centerlines, but not overrun areas at both ends.

Blast pads, also known as overrun areas or stop ways, are often constructed just before the start of a runway where jet
blast produced by large planes during the takeoff roll could otherwise erode the ground and eventually damage the
runway. Overrun areas are also constructed at the end of runways as emergency space to slowly stop planes that
overrun the runway on a landing gone wrong, or to slowly stop a plane on a rejected takeoff or a take-off gone
wrong. Blast pads are often not as strong as the main paved surface of the runway and are marked with yellow
chevrons. Planes are not allowed to taxi, take-off or land on blast pads, except in an emergency.

Displaced thresholds may be used for taxiing, takeoff, and landing rollout, but not for touchdown. A displaced
threshold often exists because obstacles just before the runway, runway strength, or noise restrictions may make the
beginning section of runway unsuitable for landings. It is marked with white paint arrows that lead up to the
beginning of the landing portion of the runway.
 Terminal
Building
Space Requirements
Public Lobby Area

Lobbies provide public circulation and access for carrying out the following functions: passenger ticketing;
passenger and visitor waiting; housing concession areas and other passenger services; and baggage claim.

Ticketing Lobby
Ticket lobby sizing is a function of total length of airline counter frontage; queuing space in front of counters;
and, additional space for lateral circulation to facilitate passenger movements. Queuing space requires a minimum of
12 to 15 feet. Lobby depths in front of the ticket counter range from 20 to 30 feet for a ticket area serving 50 gates
or more.

Waiting Lobby

Apart from providing for passenger and visitor circulation, a centralized waiting area usually provides public
seating and access to passenger amenities, including rest rooms, retail shops, food service, etc. The sizing of a
central waiting lobby is influenced by the number, seating capacity, and location of individual gate waiting areas. If
all gate areas have seating, the central waiting lobby, may be sized to seat 15 to 25 percent of the design peak hour
enplaning passengers plus visitors. However, if no gate seating areas are provided or planned, seating for 60 to 70
percent of design peak hour enplanements plus visitors should be provided.
Visitor-passenger ratios are best determined by means of local surveys. In the absence of such data, an
assumption of one visitor per peak hour originating passenger is reasonable for planning purposes.

Baggage Claim Lobby

This lobby provides public circulation space for access to baggage claim facilities and for, egress from the
claim area to the deplaning curb and ground transportation. It also furnishes space for such passenger amenities and
services as car rental counters, telephones, rest rooms, limousine service, etc.
Allowance for public circulation and passenger amenities outside the claim area ranges from 15 to 20 feet in
depth at small hub airports, 20 to 30 feet at medium hubs, and 30 to 35 feet at those airports serving large hubs.
Lobby lengths range from 50 to 75 feet for each baggage claim device. For approximating lobby length and area,
one claim device per 100 to 125 feet of baggage claim frontage should be assumed.