COWI Delivers International Airport Expertise at a Local Level

The Danish engineering consulting group is currently by ENR¹ ranked as the seventh largest international airport designer in the world, and has either completed or is currently working on significant airport projects in the Philippines, Guyana, Latvia, Bulgaria, India and Oman. The COWI Group has the capacity to cover almost all the disciplines required for a modern airport project, and the entire Group has recently been restructured to take advantage of its worldwide presence and expertise.

Close partnership

In terms of airport design and construction it means COWI's activities in this area will increasingly be conducted at a local level and in close partnership with clients. Marrying international expertise with local expertise is today a winning concept that adds most value to clients.

"COWI is now organised into a global One Company Network structure to enhance our capability to deliver state-of-the-art services in local markets through local presence and through immediate access to our global group expertise of almost 4,000 people, combined with strong local partnerships" says Klaus H. Ostenfeld, CEO.

Major investment

In the airport sector – being in the top ten list of airport consultants is an achievement in itself, but COWI has a vision to be in, and stay in, the top five of that list. Investment in competencies, coupled with a determination to create partnerships, underpins COWI's future direction in this area.

Key specialities

Worldwide, COWI has carried out more than 600 airport projects, and specialises in a variety of disciplines within the different fields of airport engineering. Our services include master planning for major international airports with the largest aircraft to small domestic airports; airport buildings, such as state-of-the-art passenger terminal buildings, air traffic control towers and other airport buildings, where close collaboration with architects ensures buildings are both flexible, cost-effective and landmarks.

COWI also has extensive experience in civil engineering, and their pavement engineers have developed unique recycling concepts for both concrete and asphalt runways and other external airport surfaces.

Airport operation and maintenance is also a key discipline. More recently, COWI has also undertaken capacity assessment, which involves the analysis of all functions of an airport to determine where likely bottlenecks may occur, anywhere from the catering provisions for passengers to security and check-in procedures.

"COWI is a preferred engineering partner for even the most complex airport projects" says Aviaplan, who has 20 years of partnership experience with COWI.

Clients have different requirements

COWI tailors solutions to the client's strategy, be it a hub airport, international airport, or domestic airport. In this way, COWI is moving closer to the client's and the shareholder's way of thinking, recognising the scale of investment demanded by airport construction and upgrading.

COWI acknowledges the differences in airport requirements around the world. Europe finds itself increasingly bereft of space for new airports so the majority of the work here is mostly the upgrading of existing facilities and the optimising of capacity and flexibility to adapt to, for example, change in types of passengers or landing and take-off slots. Here, COWI has successfully undertaken such projects in Denmark, France, Latvia and Bulgaria.

Outside of Europe, converse applies. Space is less critical which means more so-called green-field, or new, airports, a growth which is also fuelled by intense demand. Currently, COWI is involved in two, enormous airport projects, one in India and the other in Oman.

"The client segments today request new and different value propositions from airport planners. We must understand the clients' true needs to be able to meet this challenge" says Knud Erik Christensen, Head of Airport Department.

COWI A/S
Parallelvej 2
DK-2800 Kongens Lyngby
Denmark

Tel.: +45 45 97 22 11
Fax: +45 45 97 22 12
cowi@cowi.com
www.cowi.com

1 Engineering News-Record Top 200 International Design Firms, December 2006

 

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