Conjure, if you can, a mental picture of air travel in its heyday. All the delights you’re probably envisioning right now—indulgent meal service, bottomless beverage carts, perhaps even pillbox hats—were provided by the airlines, says Felipe Fraser (AMP 196, 2019), a 20-year veteran of the industry, most recently as CEO of the Swiss/Chilean company Aport SA. Airlines have since abandoned all aspirations of luxury to focus on reducing operational expenses. It’s the reason we’re seeing a bumper crop of low-cost carriers, Fraser adds. If anyone is to pick up the slack and try to make the journey comfortable, that task has to fall to the airports.

“Travel was stressful already, and even more so after COVID. The airports need to respond by making this time as relaxing as possible,” says Fraser, who is also a trained architect, serves on industry boards, and advises regional airports in Chile and Brazil. It’s not a stretch to understand why this is the case: If airports can reduce processing time through security and reduce anxiety, they will be increasing leisure time inside the airport—and commercial revenues. “But a traveler who is stressed is not going to buy anything. You shop when you’re relaxed and enjoying yourself,” Fraser says.

To create peace of mind, airports should redesign spaces around what Fraser refers to as experience technology. “That means everything from space, materials, furnishings, equipment, sound—basically how you adapt a space with the passenger in mind,” he says. First up: Bring the comfort of the lounge to the boarding hall. Tandem seating is a thing of the past, Fraser says. Among other things, he advises replacing the rows of chairs with what he calls soft seating: small couches that are comfortably spaced, or cozy clusters for three to four people at most. Picture the ambiance of a Starbucks, rather than a bus terminal.

Technology can help, too: Even before the pandemic, airports had the capacity to follow a passenger’s route through the terminal once they’d connected to the Wi-Fi. “It’s not that airports want to spy on your every move. They want to connect you to food and beverage or retail opportunities along the journey,” Fraser says. That and other technology can be adapted to reduce anxiety, improve time management, personalize boarding calls, or even for last-mile delivery within the airport. Say you find a cozy space to sit near your gate. You open your laptop and settle in to work—then you want a coffee. Instead of giving up your spot, you connect with a retailer on your phone, place an order, share your location, and the coffee is delivered to you.

We’ll see more and more of these seamless technologies, leading to an app-enabled future in which travelers can build and manage their own itineraries and use the airlines at their own convenience. “People will be freer to move about at a lower cost by arriving with airline X and departing with airline Y. That’s going to be a huge disruptor,” Fraser says. Many of these travelers, particularly in places like the United States, will be able to manage their own journey from airport arrival to boarding—but that’s not yet the reality everywhere. In markets where people are just starting to travel, there is huge space for growth and education. Airports will have to find a way to increase services for those who have greater needs, while getting out of the way of more experienced passengers so that they can enjoy themselves. As much as tech can help, “the future is still about focusing on people,” he says.

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