The case for flipping the airport design model

If ticketing no longer holds much significance, why does the ticketing lobby still dominate the architecture of a terminal?

The idea of celebrating ticketing and check-in as the beginning of a journey is now anachronism. The arrival of a passenger to a community is the most significant moment in travel today, but airports continue to send arriving passengers down to a cramped, dark space on floors that sit below underutilized ticketing counters.

Isn’t it time we reversed this model? Shouldn’t the airport welcome arriving passengers and visitors with a celebratory experience in a spacious, naturally illuminated space on a terminal’s upper level? Can’t those increasingly few who need to check bags be accommodated on the floor below?