A View on the Future of Airports: A Q&A with Cheryl McNall

Airports are the gateway to one of the fastest modes of commercial transport, helping to carry people and packages to almost anywhere in the world and fueling trillions of dollars in economic activity annually.  

With traffic growth forecast to outstrip airport capacity, the industry faces opportunities as well as challenges.  

Supporting our airport clients’ ambitions without letting a passenger or shipment miss a beat is where we excel. Our leading (according to Engineering News-Record) aviation team has nearly seven decades of experience at brownfield and greenfield commercial service, general aviation and military, delivering airport planning, architecture, engineering, program and construction management, advisory consulting and specialty services such as Operational Readiness and Airport Transition (ORAT) and asset management worldwide.  

Some of the most successful projects we work on are the ones which go unnoticed because our teams have integrated it so meticulously. We’ve held contracts on more than 500 airport projects, including most of the busiest airports in the U.S., U.K., India, and the Middle East, and many of the largest greenfield airports. 

Whether we’re upgrading aging facilities, expanding capacity or improving connectivity, we do it all through the lens of sustainable airport development and the help of our teammates like Cheryl McNall, our aviation global solutions director. In this Q&A, we connect with Cheryl to get her thoughts on the trends and technologies requiring airports to think differently for tomorrow.  

Tell us a bit about what a day in the life is like as Jacobs Global Solutions Director for Aviation, and what we offer to our clients in this area. 

For me, the Global Solutions Director (GSD) role has high potential to influence the future of our business. It requires a multifaceted understanding of aviation market trends, experience delivering complex projects which compliment our core services, and ability to form and further relationships in new regions and markets which enable our teams and capabilities to grow and serve the sector challenges better.  

Airports are mini cities with a plethora of stakeholders, so in my role as the Aviation GSD, I spend a significant portion of my day working on the periphery of aviation and transferring relevant skills between related sectors such as energy and power, ports and maritime, transportation planning and cities & places. The GSDs constitute just a handful of experts in the business and are formed horizontally across the globe. We confer on topical conversations and initiatives which advance Jacobs’ talent, strategies and business to prepare us to tackle challenges ‘beyond the horizon’. While there are many near-term successes and wins, there are equal amounts of activity which are “at the tip of the wedge" looking toward the future. 

Staying relevant to today’s challenges cannot be underestimated as aviation grapples with low staff numbers, increased passenger demand and a strong backlog of work in a new digitally-enabled era. Along with gazing toward the horizon , in my regional roles for Europe and the Middle East, I support our teams delivering projects at some of the largest and busiest airports in the world.  

Aviation is different from some other modes of transportation because it is truly a global sector requiring a global team network. As part of the wider solutions network, we connect regularly and share knowledge about projects across the regions. I’m always motivated when team members take a real interest in moving the needle. We’re agile about bringing in global experience, which allows us to apply lessons learned from other regions, where certain technologies or approaches might be more mature, and helps clients understand where they are relative to the curve.  

Speaking of staying ahead of the curve, what are some of the biggest opportunities in aviation today? 

Recognizing the importance of stakeholders and engaging with the supply chain, communicating and collaborating across the ecosystem is a big opportunity. Topics such as climate change and digital-enablement are greater than ever and aviation must work together to achieve funding and share innovation to create a more sustainable industry.  

In this article, “Pre-Empting Rising Power Demand at Airports: US Lessons for European Frameworks”, we discuss how partnerships will help to create more awareness (robustness) around an infrastructure investment plan; integration of lessons and capabilities from other sectors; and drive momentum and best practice in innovation across the ecosystem.  

Related to this, airports must  collaborate on is how to reduce Scope 1, 2 and 3 carbon emissions. The aviation sector is a significant contributor to global greenhouse gas emissions. If nothing changes, the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) predictions show a tripling in aviation CO2 emissions by 2050.  

Sustainable aviation fuels and hydrogen can provide a solution for reducing Scope 3 carbon emissions. They are both identified as  fuel that can support the decarbonization of aviation – but widespread use of zero emission aircraft is likely still more than a decade away as it requires significant capital and technology investment. As the conversation continues, so will the solutions to how airports can prepare now for hydrogen powered fleets as well as the growth in other types of carbon reduction opportunities, like lower carbon concrete being advanced at Heathrow.  

How do we help clients think differently to respond to future challenges? 

I know that I’ve just been on about transferable knowledge and skills. This is true but the adage goes something like “if you’ve seen one airport, you’ve only seen one airport.” Airport priorities are a function of the environment within which they operate. Local communities (land use planning, skills availability) regional and state-level politics (infrastructure funding and policy), and federal regulators and other governing bodies (ensuring compliance to safety, environmental, etc.) are all factors which shape the airport operational context. Not to mention how they are funded.  

In response to this question, we can flip it and say that client ambition inspires us to think differently. Reviewing the vision and mission statements of airports shows that their priorities often share similar objectives but differ in their application. Guided by the industry, our team works more closely than ever with, and alongside, clients and the supply chain to collaborate and co-create solutions. We participate in discussions addressing decarbonization and alternative energy solutions.  

We put societal value at the heart of our projects aligned directly with our approach to sustainability and always work collaboratively to drive impacts – socially, environmentally, and economically. Our social value experts have engaged with our airport clients, between North America and Middle East, in the planning stage to define their vision and establish a clear approach at the outset for knitting throughout the program.   

Is there an example you’re particularly proud of? 

In the U.K., we collaborated with five airports on a study to explore how airports need to transition infrastructure to adopt hydrogen technology. Groundbreaking at its time, this project identified three major pathways and the associated infrastructure for hydrogen supply and operation at an airport, depending on the airport’s size, location and demand for fuel. In this case, it was the ambition of the client which drove our need to collaborate across aviation and energy markets to develop a first-of-its-kind solution.  

This successful project was a great lightening conductor for Jacobs to merge the aviation sector and fuel space – and we haven't stopped there. Outside of airports, we've since engaged with airlines, industry bodies and third-party organizations to contribute to the development of guidelines about how airports can factor these elements into their master planning and development strategies even today. 

We continued this thinking with our “Airports as Catalysts for Decarbonization” research, delving into the benefits of introducing hydrogen at a big first mover like an airport, such as the community benefits or for other transport modes. As the industry moves forward, we must think outside of just the asset, airport or the aircraft. We need to think bigger and think more holistically – and that’s what this project was all about.  

Many travelers don’t consider the behind the scenes work that goes into an airport when they fly. What goes through your mind when you’re a passenger?  

The first emotion I feel is empathy knowing what challenges the airport is facing with the large number of stakeholders and their competing priorities and needs. So, while I do appreciate a flawless passenger experience or a nice-looking terminal with natural wayfinding at its core, I also empathize with the challenges of balancing diverse (and changing) passenger needs, the desire to improve revenues, safety, and implement infrastructure improvements while keeping the airport operating.  

When traveling, my thoughts go beyond what catches attention of the typical passenger – like long lines at customs or security – and instead I focus in on the parameters and constraints that led to the design, influencing things like– terminal levels and roadway access, arrival feeling, walking distance, airfield configuration leading to taxiing times, and ground service operators. Every detail matters when it comes to keeping people and goods connected and moving forward.