When the first travelers enter the new terminal at Pittsburgh International Airport (PIT) on Tuesday, they will notice more changes than just the spacious and shiny new building who greets them.
As part of the $1.7 billion renovation of the former US Airways hub in western Pennsylvania that opens on tuesdayPIT has carried out a complete renovation of its signage. Everything from the physical signage to the flight information displays, known as “FIDS,” sports a new look that is distinctly Pittsburgh.
New black and yellow pylons (yes, they’re inspired by Pittsburgh sports teams) sit at the entrances under the high, wood-toned ceiling, directing travelers to their respective airline counter or security checkpoint to catch their flight.
“The intent was to make them very visible,” said Siri Betts-Sonstegard, who oversees experience and design at PIT operator, the Allegheny County Airport Authority.
Or, in the words of Kristal Ernst, an environmental graphic designer at Gensler who worked on the PIT project, “bold and impactful.”
The update comes as airports across the country and around the world reevaluate their signage (and the information they present) for the digital age. Out are purely static signs that move travelers through an airport, but do little more than provide the basics: airline, flight, destination, gate, and departure time. It is a combination of static and digital displays that aim to incorporate data from the data-rich world we live in to improve the passenger experience.
“It’s about the ability to add more layers to the program and communicate things in additional ways beyond that core signage program, the wayfinding program that you have to put in place and that’s necessary for people to navigate the airport,” said Rob Daly, principal at the experiential signage and design firm. Introduction in Toronto, who has worked on airport signage projects around the world.
Dynamic, data-rich airport signage is being installed at airports across the country, from New York’s LaGuardia Airport (LGA) to Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport (MSP) and San Francisco International Airport (SFO), with more on the way. Globally, it is already on display in places such as Singapore Changi Airport (SIN).
The challenge for PIT was to design a “bold and impactful” signage system that would not detract from the new terminal itself. That building rises more than three stories to its distinctive roof between two arms of the more than 30-year-old X-shaped airport concourse. It replaces the PIT terminal 1992 and the automated underground train that connected it to the esplanades.
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“The new building is so wide, so big and expansive, and it has a great natural flow that doesn’t need much guidance,” Ernst said. “What it does need are bigger, more recognizable moments.”
While the most dramatic moment is undoubtedly the Alexander Calder mobile hanging in the center of the terminal, the yellow and black pylons and FIDS clad in locally sourced wood create their own, albeit brief, moments in the space.
Gensler worked with HDR and Luis Vidal + Architects on the design of the terminal.
PIT also updated how and what information is displayed as part of the signage review. That job fell to Sascha Mombartzdesigner and digital product specialist based in New York.
“We’re trying to guide people through a space,” he said. “It’s really a fact [visibility] project.”
Mombartz, in collaboration with the PIT team, came up with a hierarchy of information and how to display it in the FIDS. It was inspired by the rotating signs—plastic strips with basic flight information that airline staff could upload to a tower or remove—that used to be standard at airports across the country.
You can see the flip sign aesthetic on the FIDS screen, where each flight effectively has its own digital information card.
Two of the biggest changes travelers will notice in PIT are the decision to list flights by departure time, rather than destination, and the inclusion of airline queues in FIDS.
Sorting flights by departure time is common around the world, but not in the United States, Mombartz said. PIT made the change in an effort to improve the process for travelers.
“You can see that the things that are at the top are the [soonest]” he said. “It’s easy to find your flight because you’re simply scanning the list by time, which makes things a lot easier.”
The test will be whether American travelers – particularly those who don’t call Pittsburgh home – adapt to the change.
The inclusion of airline queues adds a consistent visual element to help travelers find their flights. The airline name is included next to the icon so travelers don’t have to distinguish an American Airlines queue from a Southwest Airlines queue.
“If it has the tail fin and the name, it’s a good solution and really practical in this use case because you can create a very uniform design,” Mombartz said. “You want to be able to scan very quickly.”
PIT’s new gate pylons display, below the airline, destination and departure time, useful information such as boarding time and codeshare flight numbers.
An advantage of mixing digital signage with static is that PIT can display other images (for example, photographs highlighting the local area) on the screens when they are not necessary for flight information.
All of these changes are visible to travelers as they pass through the new PIT terminal.
The first scheduled arrival at the terminal is United Airlines flight UA794, which departs San Francisco International Airport (SFO) on Monday night and lands at PIT at 5:12 a.m. Tuesday. And the first scheduled departure is Southwest Airlines flight WN1841 from PIT to Denver International Airport (DEN) at 5:30 am.
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