Frequently cited as one of America’s best airports, Portland International Airport (PDX) will unveil its ZGF-designed, expanded main terminal in August, with completion set for 2025. Instead of building an entirely new airport, much of PDX’s existing infrastructure was reused.
The expansion features a mass timber roof canopy and structure built from wood sourced within a 300-mile (482.8 km) radius of the terminal—paying homage to the local environment and highlighting the importance of sustainable materials and practices. ZGF’s commitment to sourcing timber from specific forests honors the contributions of the landowners to the region’s ecosystem—not only representing Portland and the Pacific Northwest, but also reinforcing the meaningful connection between a building like PDX and the people it serves. Managing Partner Sharron van der Meulen and Partner Gene Sandoval of ZGF share their perspective on these powerful connections, and the impact they can have on a region’s long-term resilience.
In 2024, as air travel demand climbs back to pre-pandemic levels, airports that are once again bustling have an opportunity to reflect on the unique role they play in serving tens of thousands of people a day—and not just passengers, but also the people who live and work in the communities near the airport.
Airports are transit hubs. They’re shopping malls. They’re cargo centers. They’re offices. And yet, at their core, airports are important civic buildings that represent the place people are traveling to and from. This role is a powerful one to play. Whether greeting visitors, welcoming residents home, or serving as the penultimate stop on a vacation or business trip, airports leave lasting impressions.
Is that impression positive? Is the airport boosting the region’s reputation, bolstering its social, environmental, and financial strength, and contributing to its growth potential? With America’s many aging airports facing $128 billion in new infrastructure needs—for terminal upgrades to improve passenger experience, accessibility, and sustainability, as Airports Council International reports—these questions loom. Now is the time for cities and airport operators to come together and make changes.
Change can be incremental, even small, and still have a positive impact, as long as the focus remains on the place and the people the airport serves. Here are six considerations:
Serve the People
In Portland, Oregon, where we live and work, Portland International Airport (PDX) serves nearly 20 million passengers each year. The newly expanded main terminal—opening August 2024—enables PDX to increase capacity over the next two decades to accommodate 35 million passengers annually.
It takes 10,000 employees to serve this many passengers, and to do it well. Ensuring that the daily experience of both passengers and employees will be positive was a primary design driver for the team at ZGF. While doubling the terminal’s capacity, we sought to maintain the small and intimate scale of PDX that people have always enjoyed, with numerous places to rest, recharge, and refuel. This scale is reflective of Portland’s pedestrian-friendly, tree-lined streets, and the approachability of the city’s neighborhoods. Employees also gain dedicated spaces to take breaks, intentionally located in places they can get to quickly and easily, even in such a large facility. We achieved this aspect by creating user profiles or personas for all of the people within PDX and mapped out their specific needs, their journeys, and their typical stress points along the way—and then designed to reduce that stress as much as we could.
We also thought about spaces where people might intersect, whether they’re travelers, employees, or other community members. PDX has long been beloved for its pre-security retail and dining options. In the expansion, we again prioritized these amenity spaces, including the creation of a pre-security space with stadium-like seating that can be used for musical performances and other gatherings, or simply for sitting and relaxing in a pleasant setting. Additional community lounges are similarly positioned to be visible and accessible to all, offering an elevated experience for everyone, with nice seating and prime views, and creating an environment where all can commingle and feel comfortable.
Deliver a Positive Experience
Maximizing comfort and ease for passengers and employees contributes greatly to minimizing their stress. Throughout our design process, we were motivated to uncover details that can be inspiring, delightful, even magical, so that people can truly relax and enjoy the airport experience.
Increasing visibility throughout the airport, with broad views of the airfield, helps to reduce the uncertainty of what lies ahead on the path from arrival to airplane, but it also helps to restore some of the romance of air travel. Biophilic design in the form of a large interior landscape and abundant natural light provides connections to nature that not only reflect the Pacific Northwest region but also reduces stress. Well-placed art installations and local music contribute to the airport’s calm oasis and offer different types of experiences for the wide variety of people using the airport.
Even the amenities that might be considered basic can have a big impact. Restrooms, for example, are so fundamental to the airport experience—or, arguably, to the experience of any public building—that, in many ways, they’re more important to get right than are other airport components. At PDX, we took an equitable approach to comfort and privacy by designing large banks of non-gendered, single-stall restrooms that can be used by individuals, families, aging adults and caregivers, parents with young kids—anyone. The design team also placed 50 modular tech poles along circulation paths to integrate technology without dependence on walls or ceilings. The poles fit within the terminal’s other urban furniture, including benches and planters, and enable the myriad of amenities for passengers and operations, including convenience outlets, WiFi, speakers and cameras.
Represent the Region
Change at all scales starts with the question of how we want people to spend their time after they’ve come through security. For PDX, the answer was local, local, local. We’re witnessing a positive shift in the aviation industry, as airports across the country thoughtfully integrate more local restaurants and retail brands, illustrating respect and support for small businesses. Such operational practices as ensuring that prices are the same inside and outside the airport also show respect for the people within an airport.
PDX represents the Portland community and Pacific Northwest region in an authentic way, celebrating its progressive spirit, verdant nature, and creative charm. The expanded terminal is designed to reflect a walk in the forest, and the open views to the airfield and natural surroundings serve as a constant reminder of where you are—unmistakably Portland.
The wooden roof, constructed of 3-inch-by-6-inch beams, glulam, and mass plywood, also firmly roots the experience in the Pacific Northwest, where timber has always been an important natural resource. Oregon produces more timber than any other U.S. state and has one of the country’s highest concentrations of employment in the forestry and lumber industry. In designing the expanded PDX terminal, it was imperative to ZGF and the Port of Portland that the project honor the people who have cared for the forest by creating a strong connection to the region’s history and ensuring that the airport’s story goes beyond sustainable design and timber certification.
Reduce Impact
Expanding passenger capacity through multiple terminals can be costly and carbon intensive, and can require duplication of many systems and services. PDX’s decision to renovate in place and expand the existing terminal helped solve many of those challenges.
By reusing much of the existing terminal, and utilizing wood, steel, and salvaged materials, we achieved a 70 percent reduction in the embodied carbon footprint of the structure. For example, we maintained the existing baggage operations system, with 12 existing operating structures linked via the existing systems.
A highly efficient envelope solves for multiple goals, increasing energy efficiency while also enriching passenger thermal and visual comfort. The combination of natural and LED lighting also contributes to the airport’s 50-percent reduction in energy usage, even as the new terminal doubles its footprint. Forty-nine skylights provide daylight to 60 percent of the terminal, even under cloudy Portland skies, and embody the lighting conditions of Pacific Northwest forests.
The long-span mass timber roof structure was also designed to create large 100-foot-by-150-foot (30 m by 46 m) bays between columns. Doing so left more existing infrastructure in place, saving time and money during construction, and the spans allow seamless passenger flow and provide long-term flexibility and ease adaptation of each space as operational standards or passenger needs evolve.
Strengthen Resilience
For PDX, sustainability also meant building an airport that will last. The structural system is designed to minimize significant damage, even in a major earthquake. This move is critical, given the airport’s location within the Cascadia subduction zone. The massive, 380,000-square-foot (35,303 sq m) and 18-million-pound (8.1 million kg) timber canopy is held up by 34 Y-shaped columns designed to let the roof structure move laterally—up to 24 inches (3.8 m)—during a seismic event.
Considering airports as important civic buildings reinforces why they must be designed to last: they are big investments. Their scale means they play a role in the broader region’s resilience, too. One key project goal was to source the wood locally and sustainably, and to track the wood products back to their forest of origin. The goal set the project team on a trajectory that cultivated transparency in the wood supply chain, and dialogue directly with landowners and mills to ensure all timber—2.6 million board feet—used in the expanded terminal’s glulam and lattice roof was sourced from Oregon and Washington forests within 300 miles (483 km) of PDX. Roughly one million board feet of the roof can be traced directly back to 13 landowners—small family forests, local tribes, nonprofits, community forests, university experimental forests, and publicly owned land.
PDX’s wood-sourcing story speaks to the region’s economic recovery and long-term stability—not just for the timber industry, which benefits from the design industry’s shift toward more sustainable mass timber, but for the Portland community as a whole.
Never Stop Improving
PDX is a beloved airport, named America’s top domestic airport in Travel + Leisure’s annual World’s Best Awards several times over. It’s long been praised for its design, amenities, accessibility, and cleanliness, with readers underscoring its emphasis on local businesses and artists.
Some might be tempted to rest on these laurels. To us, this precedent simply put the pressure on to deliver something better than the standard already set. After all, what if PDX could be considered the best airport in the world, not just the U.S.? By expanding our view to consider the airport’s relationship with the region at large, and then thinking carefully of each person who enters and enjoys PDX every day, we’re building a responsible, sustainable, and resilient connection between people and place—one we know will last. UL
