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Kevin Matthews
Joined: 13 Apr 2004
Posts: 679
Location: Eugene, Oregon
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solidred
Joined: 05 Jan 2006
Posts: 771
Location: Scotland
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 Posted: Fri Jun 06, 2008 5:40 am Post subject: |
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Personally, I go to some effort to avoid flying via Heathrow these days (not an easy task from here) although I'd love to see Terminal 5 if I was confident I could keep hold of my luggage.
You may be interested to read a companion piece in the UK's Building Design magazine:
http://www.bdonline.co.uk/story.asp?sectioncode=449&storycode=3110844&c=1 |
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Kevin
Site Admin
Joined: 13 Apr 2004
Posts: 1446
Location: Eugene, Oregon
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| Posted: Fri Jun 06, 2008 6:34 am Post subject: |
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Interesting read at BD. And thanks for sharing it. A bit snarky though, wouldn't you say?
Indeed i is great to see a major building open smoothly, on one hand, and disturbing to watch a cock-up. But either way, a building opening event is a brief spark in time, usually just a blip in the unfolding history of a major building. Seems like a bit of journalistic story-mongering to make the PR itself (and PR impact) such a big point. I'd generally rather talk about the building than the PR!
Even the extensive operational problems for months and years at the big hub airport terminal in Denver, Colorado, are now pretty much forgotten, while its big fabric roof structure sails onward as an uplifting regional identity symbol.
Keeping hold of your luggage... now isn't that just a bit old-fashioned? We're talking HIGH TECH here!
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solidred
Joined: 05 Jan 2006
Posts: 771
Location: Scotland
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| Posted: Fri Jun 06, 2008 9:21 am Post subject: |
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Building Design has, I think, deliberately moved in a tabloidy / gossipy direction which is no bad thing as it fills a niche in the professional periodicals market over here (UK).
The Terminal 5 farrago does highlight one significant architectural thing for me. As someone who worked (a long time ago) on the masterplanning and terminal 1 conceptual design for Iran's new international airport, my conclusion was that airport design was essentially an infrastructure diagram with a great wall running through the middle (the security line between national and international space as it were) which introduced a nice typological distinction at a most basic level from most other architecture, which has, obviously, the most important 'walls' as perimeter envelope.
What the T5 teething troubles highlight, in this manner of thinking, is that the modern airport is, in fact, the superimposition of a shopping mall on a baggage handling system. In terms of real operational and logistical priorities, it seems to me that this is where things more-or-less sit. I think future airport design could start to become really much more exciting if some architects start thinking architecturally about this kind of thing (Koolhaas has given it a fairly good try in as yet unrealised airport projects) rather than on sighing over the inevitable onslaught of non-architectural issues and turning his/her attention instead to designing a beautifully structured large span roof with 'stuff' below. |
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