Terminal experimentation: The transformation of experiences,events and escapes at global airports

Abstract

Recent debates in aeromobilities research have focused on global shifts in airport socialities generated by the redesign of airport terminals (Cwerner et al., 2009). This article examines transformations to identity and social relations arising from the reinvention of airport infrastructures and facilities, especially the experience of airport services. We suggest here that the arrival of ‘smart airports’, or how we use the term ‘Airport 3.0’, involves an experimentalist orientation deriving from contemporary economic and cultural life. The general argument is that the reinvention of global airport spaces is producing three key transformations: (1) experimentalist orientations arising from the deployment of new information technologies; (2) an experimental business engineering of consumer worlds, or ‘worlding’; and (3) travel-time use geared to a world of infinite innovation. Finally, the article reviews transformations in passenger experience in the light of these conceptual claims.

Keywords

Aeromobilities Airport 3.0 experimentation reinvention experience globalisation

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