In this airport, all the paths are downhill. From the airport entrance to the gates is all downhill. For arriving passengers, it is downhill again from the gates to the taxis/ground transportation (which are located on a floor below.) No more level floors punctuated by escalators. Everything is gently slanted for easier, funner walking.
Dollies, go-carts, shopping carts, wooden boards with wheels, etc, are provided free of charge so you can roll effortlessly along if desired.
This architecture takes advantage of the fact that you typically DRIVE to the airport (but then walk to the gate), and you are typically BROUGHT to the gate but then walk to the exit. So the required energy is shifted to the incoming vehicles and saved from your physical effort.
The airplane runways are perfectly level, of course.-- phundug, Jan 27 2009 Dante_27s_2015_ba_2...ry_20Shopping_20Haj shop here.... it's downhill all the way! [xenzag, Jan 28 2009] Not like this http://www.airliner...ms-F172M/0585131/L/Fun to watch, but I don't want to fly there [lurch, Jan 30 2009] Packing 'em in http://books.google...&resnum=6&ct=result"A Chicago factory applied gravity to the field of pork packing for the first time in 1863." [mylodon, Jan 30 2009] Walking downhill hurts my knees and I have bad experience of trundling through an airport on a luggage trolley. Given that the current climate has us all driving too much and exercising too little - fish.-- Twizz, Jan 28 2009 [+] for anything to make airports more rational in design. I don't think the inclined floor would be too much of a problem because I don't think it would need to be very steep at all - only 1 or 2 degrees.-- MadnessInMyMethod, Jan 28 2009 Aw, I was hoping you'd put the runway on a slope. This would help save energy - airplanes taking off would get an extra push from gravity, and landing airplanes wouldn't need to brake.-- Worldgineer, Jan 28 2009 Now I am not a pilot but I suspect landing on an (upward) incline is easier --- cause you can just fly along pretty level and eventually you will hit the ground...-- madness, Jan 28 2009 Really this applies to every sort of structure which one exits and enters. Supermarkets, for example, could be arranged as one long sloping corridor. Casinos could also slope, with progressively stronger drinks and games with worse odds as one gravitated along.-- bungston, Jan 28 2009 An Escher airport?-- Jinbish, Jan 28 2009 [bungston]- I don't think it applies to supermarkets, because after you exit, you have to get back to your car again which would be uphill from you if the store had been on a downhill. Stores don't want to or can't install escalators or elevators for that many people. Also, in a store you tend to stop every few feet, whereas at an airport you have to walk for miles nonstop, so might as well roll.-- phundug, Jan 28 2009 // Supermarkets, for example, could be arranged as one long sloping corridor.// ahem - see link-- xenzag, Jan 28 2009 The slope concept has been done in Seattle's public library (escalators up, slope down in a circle around the outside), the Guggenheim, and several other prominent buildings. But I like the elegant design this would add to airports in particular.-- Worldgineer, Jan 29 2009 Yes, God forbid that people should expend too much energy walking...-- hippo, Jan 29 2009 Just wait a century or so, I'd say by then the average human will be roughly spherical. Then your downhill strucrures will let everyone just roll through...-- Custardguts, Jan 29 2009 random, halfbakery