Flagstaff airport director asks arts commission to help redesign terminal entry, add wayfinding and service-animal areas

Brian Gault, director of the Flagstaff Pulliam Airport, asked the Visual and Public Art Commission on July 14 to consider partnering on a targeted redesign of the airport’s terminal entry and adjacent hardscape and landscaping. He said the goal is to make the entrance more welcoming, improve wayfinding and add amenities such as seating and service-animal relief areas that meet recent federal requirements.

The request came during the commission’s regular meeting when staff introduced Gault and asked him to outline needs that could be considered for the commission’s October retreat. "We expect about 160,000 passengers to come through the airport in 2025," Gault said, noting that about 60% of those are visitors to the region and that the airport sees between four and nine daily commercial flights on 70-seat CRJ-700 aircraft. "We're a regional airport," he added, describing current service and recent terminal upgrades.

Why it matters: The terminal’s curb-front area is often the first and last impression visitors get of Flagstaff. Commissioners and staff told Gault they viewed a focused, design-led improvement as an opportunity to support tourism and improve accessibility while meeting regulatory obligations for service-animal relief spaces.

Gault described specific problems: tired or dead plantings (he estimated about 80% of previously planted aspens have died), cracked or uneven sidewalks, limited outdoor seating and inconsistent wayfinding, especially after the airport opened a second economy parking lot. He also described recent improvements—an on-site visitor center in partnership with Discover Flagstaff, micro-markets and new signage—and federal CARES Act grant funding that supported operations and about $6 million in airfield maintenance projects.

On regulatory compliance, Gault said "somewhat recent federal legislation has mandated that airports our size have service animal relief areas that meet certain federal standards on both sides of the TSA checkpoint." He presented an example of a designed relief area used by another airport and suggested Flagstaff’s front entry landscape could accommodate that requirement while improving aesthetics.

Commissioners and staff asked about scope and procurement. Gault said the airport has on-call landscape architects, a capital project manager familiar with airport projects (Adam Alley), and that the project could be divided into manageable pieces—hardscape islands, seating, columns and wayfinding—so it would not require a single large capital appropriation. He recommended the commission discuss a design team that could include both a landscape architect and an artist to develop airport identity through color, materials and signage.

No formal action or vote was taken. Commissioners agreed to discuss the concept further at the commission’s October retreat; staff planned to add the proposal to the retreat agenda for scope and funding discussion. Several commissioners described the proposal as a strong fit for the commission’s priorities, emphasizing tourism and visitor experience, but raised questions about procurement, project phasing and staffing.

Next steps and context: The topic will return to the commission’s October retreat for scope definition, identification of a project manager, and discussion of a design team that could include an artist for wayfinding and identity elements. Any work that requires capital funding or grants would follow the city’s procurement and capital project procedures.

"We see a lot of mix of those commercial flights...and a lot of private aircraft," Gault said in presenting the airport context and passenger flows. "One of the challenges we have is…wayfinding on the outside of the building, especially now that we've opened a second parking lot."