Kasarda | Aerotropolis engines beyond Asia (part 1)

Aerotropolis concept leader, Dr John Kasarda, provides an update of airport city and aerotropolis developments in the Americas, Europe, Africa and the Middle East, and considers the implications of the coronavirus pandemic on aviation and future developments.

Last issue, I described how the Asia-Pacific region leads airport city and aerotropolis development. Other world regions are also moving forward. Western Europe has built on its early airport city successes, while the Americas awoke from aerotropolis slumber with major projects, as have Africa and the Middle East.

Let’s look at these and what the unprecedented 2020 health, economic and aviation “triple whammy” portends for them.

Europe

The granddaddy of airport cities, Amsterdam Schiphol (AMS) was first to formally embrace the concept in the 1990s under the brand Schiphol AirportCity. Its core is Schiphol Central Business District (CBD) where the passenger terminal and forecourt area offer two million square metres of retail, office buildings (including the European headquarters of Microsoft), three 4-star hotels, conference facilities, art galleries, a casino, health clubs and restaurants.

The Base, a 47,000-square-metre office and commercial services complex a 10-minute walk from the terminal, was completed in late 2019. In total, 65,000 people work on AMS’s 2,787 hectares encompassing five additional commercial/industrial zones supplementing Schiphol CBD. 

The Schiphol Area Development Company (SADC), a public-private partnership (PPP), spearheads Schiphol’s greater aerotropolis. The SADC markets several business and logistics parks, including Schiphol Trade Park, Business Park De President, Schiphol Logistics Park, Polaner Park, Green Park Aalsmeer, Business Park Amsterdam Osdorp, and Schiphol Rijk.

Zuidas, a large mixed-use business district seven minutes by transit to AMS, houses the corporate headquarters of numerous Dutch firms, while the famous Aalsmeer Flower Auction five minutes away sells 20 million flowers and decorative plants each weekday for global shipment.

The Paris Charles de Gaulle–Le Bourget Airport Area (420km2) is among the world’s fastest-developing aerotropolises, containing 17 logistics parks, 85 business parks, two international-class exhibition and convention complexes, and 12,000 hotel rooms in 2019.

Its multi-modal commercial epicentre is 1,340 hectares on Paris Charles de Gaulle Airport (CDG) dedicated to non-aeronautical development of which hotels, office buildings, retail, and distribution facilities already occupy 600 hectares. Overall, CDG Airport City hosts 700+ firms employing 90,000, placing it among the largest airport cities globally.

Stretching outward from CDG, 25 major commercial projects have either been recently completed or planned. These include the International Trade Centre, the largest integrated business and congress complex in Europe that opened in 2019 near CDG’s perimeter hotel cluster. These 25 projects are expected to generate €15 billion in investment and 130,000 jobs by 2025.

Over 1,000 firms are located at Frankfurt Airport (FRA) and its immediate environs, making up Frankfurt Airport City. Its landmark commercial structure, ‘The Squaire’, a 660-metre-long, nine-story edifice employing a total of 10,000, is less than a 10-minute covered walk to FRA’s check-in counters.

Auditing and consulting giant KPMG’s European headquarters occupies 40,000 of The Squaire’s 140,000sqm that additionally house the headquarters of Fraport (the airport’s operator), two hotels, shops and restaurants.

Two other key components of Frankfurt Airport City are Gateway Gardens (headquarters to LSG Sky Chefs and others) and the 750,000-square-metre Mönchhof Logistics Park. Gateway Gardens also houses three hotels (completed since 2017) along with higher education, medical, exhibition, and leisure facilities, while Mönchhof is reputedly the largest contiguous block of logistically zoned land being constructed in the Rhine–Main region.

Surrounding green areas and protected forests (Frankfurt City Forest) spatially constrain aerotropolis development. Accordingly, Fraport and others strive to make the highest and best use of commercial and logistics properties on and adjacent to FRA.

Known as ‘Aviapolis’, Finland’s 42-square-kilometre aerotropolis is being developed around Helsinki Airport (HEL) via PPP between the city of Vantaa (HEL’s location), Finavia (the airport’s operator), real estate firms, and local landowners.

Aviapolis contains a significant hotel cluster (three completed since 2017), a congress centre, the 87,000sqm Flamingo Entertainment Centre and, adjacent 86,100sqm Jumbo shopping centre employing 1,500, the Helsinki Airport World Trade Centre and Vantaa Business

Park’s seven office buildings (housing numerous firms along with a Technopolis campus providing technology-oriented firms space and supporting services). About 2,000 companies call Aviapolis home, employing more than 35,000 people.

Airport city projects are also underway at Munich Airport (MUC), which has a 551-room five-star Hilton Hotel between Terminals 1 and 2 with an adjacent special events area plus a full-service medical clinic.

MUC is likewise developing a future-oriented innovation campus on 500,000sqm of land. Other airport cities and aerotropolises from Athens to Zurich (also including Manchester, Moscow Domodedovo, Prague and Vienna, among others) are evolving throughout Europe.

The article is originally published on Airport World Issue 1, 2020.