An innovation for boarding and disembarking passengers from planes at Madrid-Barajas Adolfo Suarez Airport is attracting interest. The site recently became the first major airport in the world to replace all traditional jetways with new automated equipment, supervised from dedicated control rooms. AENA, its manager, announced this at the Passenger Terminal Expo & Conference held in the Spanish capital in early April.
As reported by the Aviation Journal, stereoscopic cameras and programs based on artificial intelligence will guide jetways to aircraft doors, connecting them to terminals. A way to make the process faster, more secure, and more flexible, without requiring on-site staff to carry out a rather time-consuming and formal task.
Madrid Airport is making headlines with this technology, as it is the first to complete the replacement phase of all its telescopic jetways located at the gates of its terminals. The Spanish capital's site has five terminals, which required the replacement of 129 jetways in total. A process that took less than a year, since the airport manager, AENA, gradually rolled out its new system from June 2024 to February 2025.
The ambitions of the world's largest airport manager, AENA
It should be noted that the AENA group, based in Madrid, is a subsidiary of the Spanish public company ENAIRE, financed by the Ministry of Transport. The capital's airport is not the only one under its management. There are 46 of them in the country alone. But that's not all, AENA is also present in Brazil with 17 airports, as well as at Luton Airport, which serves travelers to London. In total, AENA represented 369 million travelers in 2024 (enough to give it the gold medal among airport operators in the world).
According to the manager, quoted by the Journal de l'Aviation, the automation of the airport thanks to these new jetways has aroused the interest of around fifteen airlines and airports, who have reportedly visited the facilities. These are designed by TK Elevator, a German company specializing in vertical and horizontal transport, which also manufactures escalators, elevators, and moving walkways.
AENA does not intend to stop there in terms of innovation in its airports. At the opening of the Passenger Terminal Expo & Conference in Madrid, the company's Executive Vice President, Javier Marín, announced that "Aena is about to undertake the largest airport investment program in Europe and the world in the coming years."He did not specify, however, which other airports will benefit from these automated jetways as a priority in the coming months.
Source: Journal de l'Aviation
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