Airport Experience® News - Customer Service Issue 2025

BEFORE YOU TAKE OFF

THE PRETENDERS Thousands Of Pittsburgh-Area Residents Helped PIT Fine Tune Its New Terminal

BY SARAH BELING

or all of the planning, projection and preparation that goes into building a new terminal, it’s still

from 10 to 50 checks and balances in each one,” says Bryan. “With ORAT trials, we bring in frontline staff and test real-world scenarios, and they’re part of the decision on whether something is a pass or a fail,” says Bryan. “I always say, ‘It’s your operation, your trial,’ and before each trial we agree together on the success criteria,” he adds. “This step-by-step approach allows us to validate processes, fine-tune systems and ensure every element meets the operational needs of the staff who will use it every day. Once confidence is built, we begin linking those elements together, gradually increasing complexity until we’re ready to invite the public in.” And at PIT, there was plenty of public interest in the terminal trial, adds Bryan. “At other airports, the hardest part is often getting enough volunteers. At PIT, leadership said, ‘No problem, our community will show up.’ And they did – more than 18,000 people registered to take part,” says Bryan. “In all my experience, I’ve never seen a community rally like that anywhere in the world.” The airport’s first public trial, which engaged 300 volunteers in testing more than 40 aspects of day-to-day airport operations, “performed very well,” says Bryan, and gave officials the confidence to confirm that the terminal will be ready for a fall opening after a second trial featuring over 2,000 volunteers. “Feedback from the first public trial was overwhelmingly positive,” says Bryan, with passengers, airline stakeholders and staff providing valuable suggestions around wayfinding, stanchion layouts, baggage belts and TSA checkpoints, some of which “are already being addressed,” says Bryan. “These kinds of insights are exactly why we run trials,” he says. “They not only validate what’s working but also highlight opportunities to fine-tune, ensuring we’re fully prepared for day one.”

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a challenge for airports to know how their designs will function when put to the test of real-time passenger travel. But for the team at Pittsburgh International Airport (PIT), scheduled to unveil its newly reimagined facility this fall, a public “dress rehearsal” provided a valuable preview of how the space will perform once packed with Pittsburgh passengers. “I’ve had the opportunity to work all over the world on capital projects, and I’ve seen firsthand the value of dress rehearsals,” says Daniel Bryan, head of the airport’s Operational Readiness Activation and Transition (ORAT) team. “Dress rehearsals are part of international best practice, and they’ve been critical everywhere I’ve worked,” he adds. “The scale and focus change from project to project, but the principle is always the same: start small, build complexity and then move to public-facing trials.” What makes PIT different from other airports, Bryan says, “is how early they embraced ORAT. In the U.S., ORAT is still relatively new – most clients know they want it, but don’t always know what it is or when to use it. Normally I’m explaining why trials are essential; at PIT, the question was never ‘Why should we trial?’ It was, ‘When can we trial?’ That mindset is rare,” says Bryan. “PIT also understood that to maximize benefit – ORAT needs to be built in from the design stage, not left as a handover exercise.” Testing, Testing… Before hosting the first of its two public trials, the PIT team conducted approximately 50 smaller tests with operational staff, each focused on a specific part of the passenger journey or single system,“with anywhere

Above: With a new terminal going “live”

this autumn, Pittsburgh International Airport in September tapped more than 2,000 local residents for a trial run of systems and processes.

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AX NEWS OCTOBER/NOVEMBER 2025