Aviation Innovation Through Acoustics
Facilitating an Accessible Travel Experience Through Intelligent Acoustics Design | June 17, 2024
In a world where most environments emphasize interactivity and efficiency, airports have also adapted to meet these growing demands.
As hubs of constant activity, airport designs incorporate unique spaces and amenities. However, as new features are added, it becomes essential to prioritize the overall impact to acoustics within the airport terminals.
When considering airport design, it’s important to keep the focus on the primary purpose of airports – facilitating travel. Design enhancements & new features must not compromise overall airport operations & patron experience.
In today’s hyperconnected world, people seek out constant stimulation when in a stressful or stagnant environment. When taking that into consideration, designers are able to make decisions that may include the integration of playgrounds, decompression spaces, interactive zones, private meeting or work rooms, and more.
Additions that may produce additional noise to the space highlight the importance of space planning, highlighting the need for acoustics design from the project’s inception.
Airports are stressful enough.
Airports are inherently noisy environments. The constant activity, both indoors and out, generates a lot of sound. Beyond the bustling terminals, it’s also essential to account for the sources of noise behind the scenes.
HVAC systems and other mechanical equipment, airport staff offices, and the TSA machinery generate “hidden” noise within airports adds another layer of complexity to their acoustical considerations.
When considering airport acoustics, we must think about each person’s individual experience. Communication is invaluable to patron’s travel and enables airport staff to perform their duties efficiently.
High quality communication is achieved with great sound isolation. This comes from walls with great Sound Transmission Class (STC) ratings in private rooms and proper space planning to separate the loud equipment rooms from the concourse.
Accessibility is crucial in airports, giving everyone the opportunity to experience travel without limitations.
When designing terminal areas, an abundance of sound-absorbing surfaces will help to control the reverberation time of the noise.
The overall goal of incorporating acoustics design, is to control ambient noise, keeping it at an acceptable level inside the building. This ensures that the space is loud enough to mask some sound, but not too loud to distract the public’s ability to hear announcements and conversations.
Accessibility is crucial in airports, giving everyone the opportunity to experience travel without limitations.
Speech intelligibility is often thought of as only being important for individuals with hearing impairments, but in a notoriously loud space, it is essential for individuals of all hearing abilities to be able to understand the announcements that are being made about air travel.
Giving airport patrons the opportunity to clearly hear important announcements, will allow them to have a smooth and convenient travel experience.
Speech intelligibility refers to the comprehension of speech, allowing listeners to discern specific words and phrases over background noise.
Achieving quality speech intelligibility comes down to the signal to noise ratio. The signal is the message that’s important to hear over a loudspeaker. It’s important to keep the background noise quiet and the signal loud enough to be heard over the background noise.
Audio signals must be high enough quality to understand the high frequency consonant sounds like T’s and P’s. The lower frequency vowels are less important for speech in the English language, but you should still be able to hear them.
Limiting the information broadcasted through loudspeakers to be specific to the individuals in a particular area is one potential solution to effective speech intelligibility.
Being mindful of the loudspeaker levels, especially at higher frequency ranges is also essential.
Adding New Spaces
Airport acoustics present many challenges, with various components contributing to the complexity of the acoustical environment. However, despite these challenges, it’s possible to integrate additional, innovative spaces into airports with the expertise of an acoustics consultant.
Involving a consultant from the project’s inception, allows designs to explore creative solutions and brainstorm possibilities for enhancing the travel experience while accommodating the diverse needs of travelers.
For more acoustics insights, check out an article from our Acoustics Discipline Lead about LEED Documentation.
