Symbiosis between airports and railways:
Enhancing door-to-gate passenger experience through AI in the case of Milan Bergamo Airport
Research question:
How can user-oriented design be used with Al as a tool, to optimize the passenger door-to-gate experience in airports, by enhancing railway connectivity?
Location
Bergamo, Italy
Status
Master Thesis Project
Supervisor
Eugenio Morello
Typology
Airport, Mobility
Year
2023
"We call ourselves Homo sapiens because our intelligence is so important to us, even though for thousands of years we have tried to understand how we think and act"
— Stuart J. Russell and Peter Norvig
We design buildings, airports, and infrastructures for the people as users, but yet we still experience spaces that seem to be designed for objects, rather than humans.
In the era of a globalized economy and highly dynamic competition for economic activities around the world, airports increasingly represent themselves as the most strategically important transport infrastructures. Their attractiveness and impact on the city depend on their accessibility, which is highly affected by the quality of connections, mainly railway connections. The thesis proposes a conceptual design intervention that shows the importance of symbiosis between airports and railways, considering Orio al Serio Airport, since it has future mobility plans and potential which consider the same objectives of the thesis and offers a perspective for improvement. Using AI as a tool will be proposed, for processing the data of passengers’ preferences, and offering a suitable route depending on their needs. The idea is to develop an AI platform, which can communicate with the passengers through an app, suggesting which route to take considering the passenger’s preferences and amount of people present in the airport. The design does not depend on AI, for the most optimal passenger experience, it is suggested to use AI. The design itself already improves the passengers’ experience when using rail as a mode of airport accessibility.
The main airport system of Milan, is composed of three airports, Milan Malpensa (MXP), Linate Airport (LIN) and the airport in the province of Bergamo, Orio al Serio (BGY), also known by the names “ Il Caravaggio International Airport ”(Official) and“ Milan Bergamo Airport ”(commercial), It is considered as an airport of Milan also, due to the connection of the airport with the city of Milan, which is currently only a shuttle bus, and the low-cost flight offers. The airport is located 5km from the city of Bergamo, in the municipality Orio al Serio, where the name actually comes from, and 50km from Milan. It is the third busiest airport in Italy, and second busiest airport in Milan, with around 14 million passengers per year.
The airport was established in 1937, for miliatry purposes, however in 1972 it had its first civil flight. Since the airport has been build, the industries in the city moved to this zones and have made a significant impact for most of Italy’s income. The airport is located in the middle of Lombardy, Italy’s most industrialized area, and in the center of the Europe’s central southern region. Within a radius of 90 minutes, more than 25% of the Italian Economy is produced. Because of its location in front of the A4 freeway, the major Italian logistics hubs and end users can easily be reached by the flow of products arriving and leaving, reducing travel times. The airport started to exponentially expand after Ryanair started operating there in 2003, quickly becoming the Italian airport of choice for low-cost flights. The commercial section of the terminal was enlarged in December 2009 to include new services, stores, and refreshment areas to reduce traveler waiting times. Ten years later, the area designated for non-Schengen flights was also extended.
Orio al Serio airport can be currently accessed either by car or by bus. If reaching the airport by car, the A4 freeway is used, along which the airport is locted. It can be also easily accessible by bus, either from Milan or from Bergamo. Numerous companies offer daily service between the airport and the major cities in northern Italy as well as the rest of the peninsula. Although a train station will be built at Bergamo Airport by 2026, it is currently 3.5 miles (5.6 km) away at Bergamo Railway Station. Between the airport and the train stop, there isn’t an official shuttle. About 10 minutes from the train station, there is a bus service run by ATB that links to the airport.
If airports have areas and footprints as big as city centres, why is their accessibility not of the same importance as that of city centres?
The aim is to improve and optimize through design, the unbalanced and rigid movement patterns when it comes to railway accessibility in airports, by focusing on the user’s needs and preferences which can be assisted by AI. People have different needs when using public transport and airports, and that is why we need to think of flexible and adaptable infrastructures. Since we are the ones that create them, we have the power and ability to improve them and adapt them to our needs.
The rapid technological changes and inventions, created by us, the people, have affected the world and our lives, to move in a progressive, dynamic, and flexible direction. Such changes are followed by fast urban development and increased demand for mobility, both locally and internationally. In the era of a globalized economy and highly dynamic competition for economic activities around the world, airports increasingly represent themselves as the most strategically important transport infrastructures. Their attractiveness and impact on the city depend on their accessibility, which is highly affected by the quality of connections, mainly railway connections. However, as much as we are moving forward, we are also moving in an ignorant direction, we tend to forget and neglect our needs while undergoing the impacts of these rapid changes. We still experience and face problems in understanding our needs, and preferences, understanding ourselves in general, and building structures and facilities that do not respond to our needs. We design buildings, airports, and infrastructures for the people as users, but yet we still experience spaces that seem to be designed for objects, rather than humans. The new dynamic pace of life, requires different spaces through which we move, spaces that respond to the users’ preferences and style of living. The patterns and movements of people, have to align with the general technological progressions, in order to avoid the problems which we are facing today. Such alignment and balance can be improved by designing human-oriented facilities and using AI as a tool to assist the users and understand their preferences when using complex infrastructures and buildings.
Integrating AI in airports, particularly the connections between railways and airports, means analyzing, observing, and experimenting with current present conditions and challenges, and through a combination of digital and physical interaction, to propose a solution for the future.
Airports + Railways + AI
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