The C&H architecture workshop was founded
in 1976 in Toulouse.
Throughout its history,
it has been an active actor in all areas of
construction.
It has built in Toulouse and its
surroundings buildings that have attracted
the attention of national magazines.
An
example is the Center of Contemporary
Art in Labège that received the 2nd prize of
Silver Bracket Monitor of Public Works
award in 1986. C&H bore the name of the
region internationally when winning the
competition for the French Embassy in
Bogota, Colombia. In 2006, the two architects
received the Palms of the Academy
of Architecture (The Foundation Soufaché),
and the prize for the finest steel work
construction with the Airbus A380 Final
Assembly Line in Blagnac.
Toulouse-Blagnac : a long-haul project
In 1978 Toulouse-Blagnac airport handled 1,5 million passengers. Today, they are 6,3 million and by 2015 they will be up to 8,7 million.
An essential facility for South-Western France ranking 20th in Europe, the airport has grown in phase with the evolving imperatives of airline companies and local operators. It has also anticipated and kept pace with international changes in regulations and security measures.
Hall A : Preserving unity and flexibility Hall A was built in bow position to the north-east of the terminal to serve small passenger planes – from 20 to 100 seats – that are not be adapted to the largescale articulated boarding/disembarkation bridges.
These aircraft, which fly transversal routes to destinations such as Nantes, Lyons or Geneva, are known in local jargon as ‘remote posts’, and needed a hall facility near to their parking zones. A hall with departure and arrival levels that ran on without a break in flow from those of Hall B.
Hall D : Dual play – of levels and of façades
Hall D appears as the logical outcome of all the thought that has gone into designing the terminal since 1986. It rounds off the application of the original pear-shaped system of circulations, and initiates in counterpart a series of lines (circulation routes and buildings) parallel to the runways.
At the same time it confirms the pertinence of a third level, to handle transit passengers, and pursues the logic of securing,
comfortable and safe conditions, which must prevail everywhere in the terminal from the moment people arrive to the moment they leave.
Holding to these directives has entailed overcoming countless difficulties.
For example, to control the interpenetration of functions in D with those of Halls A, B and C, which were already under constraint by the presence of the existing viaduct, the height of the departure level had to be raised from 4,6 m to 5,6 m. This extra metre of height favoured the extension of the intermediate level for transit passenger movements.
Late 2009, the year it came into service, only 4 extra boarding bridges are operational, and the transit level alone is open to the public, assuming all the functions of the departure and arrival levels.
This stand-by mode to absorb the increase in traffic will nonetheless enable the terminal to handle some 2 million extra passengers per annum, taking overall capacity to 8,5 million.
Hall B, Hall C and IFBS
Congenial design for top level security Until recently, Israel was the only country that did manual checking of all luggage taken aboard passenger aircraft.
Toulouse-Blagnac has inaugurated the world’s first centralized system for 100% luggage control. The system combines top-performing electro-mechanical, computerized and radiographic scanning technologies, which subject each luggage brought to the check-in counter to three stringent checks. If any doubt remains after the third check, the passenger is summoned under guard to open the piece and assist manual inspection by agents.
Security imposed the complete re-design of check-in counters at Toulouse Blagnac.
The first completed overhaul, as shown here in Hall B, has made technical necessity the mother of invention to deliver an image that is anything but strict black and white, as it tended to be in the past.
Rich colours, luminous insets and the use of shiny stainless steel in practical details make up for the sparseness of natural light in this hall, which is one of the terminal’s oldest buildings
C&H have some essential references in the field
of major public projects :
• Extensions of Toulouse Blagnac Airport:Halls A, B and C
and modifications induced by anti-terrorist measures, Hall D.
• Extension and security improvements at the Stadium in Toulouse.
• Construction of the Cité de l’Espace in Toulouse.
• Construction of the Cancer University Clinic of Toulouse.
• Construction of the Pierre Paul Riquet Clinic in Toulouse Purpan Hospital.
• Construction of the Pavilion of France at EXPO Zaragoza.
A steady presence at Airbus Industrie has also to be noted with
the completion of various buildings:
• A330/A340 final assembly line in the SETEC / Calvo - Tran Van venture.
• A380 final assembly line in the Technip - ADPi venture.
• A330/A340 paint shops.
• Maintenance halls for the A330/A340/A380 (4WBI).
• A330/340 Cabin equipment halls.
• A320/330/340 paint shop.
CARDETE HUET ARCHITECTES
38, rue Alfred Dumeril
31400 TOULOUSE
Tel: +33 5 61 53 76 02
Fax: + 33 5 61 25 99 42
e-mail: cardete.huet@ch.tm.fr
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Hall A was built in bow position to the north-east of the terminal to serve small passenger planes – from 20 to 100 seats – that are not be adapted to the largescale articulated boarding/disembarkation bridges.
Hall B, Hall C and IFBS
CARDETE HUET ARCHITECTES