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Gateways under the spotlight: How Europe’s smart airports can lead in seamless, sustainable travel 

insight
August 29, 2025
9 min read

Author

Thomas Steirer

 

Thomas Steirer is Chief Technology Officer (CTO) at Nagarro. His focus is on developing scalable and sustainable solutions that are primarily designed to deliver valuable information.

 

 

Vinay Yadav



Vinay Yadav is Practice Lead, Travel and Transportation at Nagarro. With 16 years of experience in travel technologies, he focuses on driving innovative and reliable solutions that elevate passenger experience. 

When Paris hosted the 2024 Olympic Games and Germany hosted the 2024 European Soccer Championships, the real challenge was not just the stadiums, but the mobility systems and  smart airports that had to transport millions of people. Each journey became part of a Europe-wide test of mobility that is AI-enabled, carbon-conscious, and seamlessly connected. 

Europe’s mix of rich culture and advanced infrastructure is unmatched. High-speed rail links nations in hours, cities offer smart mobility services with electric fleets, and smart airports lead the world in the use of sustainable aviation fuel. Together, these are the building blocks of a vision where journeys are as seamless as the destinations are unforgettable. 

Policy is driving this vision forward with the ITS Directive, 5G transport corridors and the single digital ticket. But regulations alone are not enough. Every major event must be treated like a live stress test to prove that AI, automation, and  sustainability can work together during periods of peak demand. When millions of people can travel smoothly, sustainably, and with confidence under global control, Europe will set the global standard for connected, sustainable travel in the 21st century. 

Events as testbeds for the future of airport and mobility systems

 

Major European events don’t just draw crowds, they pressure-test the smart airport systems and infrastructure, under conditions no simulation can match. Each becomes a laboratory for innovation, stress-testing solutions that will define the next decade of mobility.  

1. Paris 2024 Olympics 
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The Challenge: Millions of arrivals over a compressed period risked overwhelming Paris’s airport gateways and city-wide mobility systems. 

Response: 

  • Dedicated MaaS app integrating public transport, airport transfers, and last-mile options.
  • Capacity-aware routing and AI-powered crowd analytics for real-time passenger distribution.
  • Coordinated scheduling between air, rail, and metro operators to handle peak inbound flows. 
     

Transformation: Accelerated airport–city infrastructure upgrades, new intermodal playbooks, and a scalable model for handling extreme passenger surges. (Sources: Paris 2024 Official Reports, MaaS Alliance)

2. UEFA EURO 2024 (Germany) 
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The Challenge: Matches spread across multiple cities risked overloading regional airports, creating congestion, and generating high travel emissions. 

Response: 

  • Integrated ticketing bundling 36-hour local transit, discounted intercity rail, and Interrail offers.
  • ESG measures targeting travel-related emissions, which comprised nearly 80% of the event footprint.
  • Collaboration between airports and rail operators to encourage mode shift from private cars. 
     
Transformation: Significant reductions in travel emissions versus forecasts, demonstrated feasibility of large-scale car-to-rail shifts, and strengthened airport–rail operational partnerships. 
 Sources: UEFA Sustainability Report, Deutsche Bahn, Interrail 

Balancing Capacity, Compliance, and Carbon 

Mega-events and surging mobility demand are exposing a new triad of stress points in European air travel - capacity, compliance, and carbon. Each must evolve in tandem; otherwise, airports risk a systemic breakdown when pressure peaks. 

 

Capacity: Scaling flights, passengers, and baggage together 

Capacity isn’t just “being able to move” more people; it is the combined scaling of aircraft operations, passenger flows, and baggage systems. 

  • Operations: Runway slot throughput, gate optimization, and autonomous ground vehicles are transforming turnaround efficiency during peak traffic.
  • Passengers: Intelligent queuing and AI in airports, such as biometric One-ID streamline verification and border crossings, ensuring throughput even under crowd surges.
  • Baggage: Robotics and AI-driven handling systems minimize errors, accelerate transfer speeds, and reduce the risk of lost luggage—transforming the baggage hall from a bottleneck to an enabler of seamless travel. 

Actual resilience comes from expanding these three pillars in sync, supported by autonomous orchestration and adaptive collaboration across airports, airlines, and ground transport. 

Enhancing capacity at airports

Compliance: The EU AI Act as a license for trust 

 

The EU AI Act, taking effect in 2026, is more than a legal framework—it is the operating license for trust in the aviation ecosystem. 

  • Reframing compliance: Unsafe AI will be banned, high-risk systems, such as biometric gates, will require rigorous transparency, and even general-purpose AI will be governed by enforceable codes of conduct. 
  • Trust-building mechanisms: By mandating privacy by design, explainability, and auditability, the Act transforms compliance from box-ticking into a confidence multiplier for travelers, operators, and regulators alike.
  • Systemic safeguards: Aligned with the GDPR and NIS2, airports must ensure that data, systems, and robotics are not only compliant but also demonstrably secure—making compliance a source of legitimacy in the eyes of the public. 
AI-enabled mobility

Carbon: The new currency of aviation legitimacy 

 

Carbon is no longer a secondary KPI - it is the measure by which aviation legitimacy will be judged. 

  • Binding regulation: ReFuelEU Aviation mandates SAF blending from 2025 onward, but this is just the minimum requirement. Airports are expected to electrify fleets, deploy renewable-powered terminals, and experiment with hydrogen corridors.
  • Operational intelligence: Real-time emissions monitoring will soon be as central as passenger flow dashboards, guiding decisions on taxi times, gate assignments, and ground logistics.
  • From neutral to credible: Merely offsetting is no longer enough. Smart airports that integrate airport sustainability into daily operations, carbon efficiency into every layer of capacity planning and compliance will set the benchmark for sustainable legitimacy in the global aviation industry. 
sustainable travel

Technology with trust and humanity 

Delivering on the Capacity–Compliance–Carbon promise demands human-centered, ethical, and sovereign technology. 

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Shared data platforms (GAIA-X)
GAIA-X is a European initiative that enables airports, public transportation, and event organizers to securely share data across borders. It ensures all data exchange follows GDPR privacy rules and comes with trust labels that guarantee transparency and interoperability. 

Event Insight: With GAIA-X, flight schedules, train timetables, and crowd movement data can flow together in real-time, making large-scale event travel both seamless and secure. 
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AI with human oversight
Not all decisions can be left to machines. Human-in-the-loop AI refers to systems that are designed to allow operators to step in, audit, or override AI decisions when necessary. This is especially critical for surge routing, security checks, or emergency response. 

Event Insight: At airport control centers, embedding staff into AI loops ensures that while AI speeds up predictions and routing, humans maintain the final say, reinforcing safety and public trust. 
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Robotics & smart devices with a service mindset

Robotics and the Internet of Things (IoT) can do more than automate, they can make airports feel more welcoming. For instance, passenger-assist robots can guide travelers in natural language (even the passenger’s own preferred language), adaptive wheelchairs can adjust to passenger needs, and smart kiosks can respond to live queries. 

Event Insight: When robotics and IoT are designed with a hospitality mindset, terminals transform into attentive, service-oriented spaces that combine efficiency with care. 

From biometric One-ID, which speeds up identity checks, to Sustainable Aviation Fuel reducing emissions, to GAIA-X platforms and human-guided AI improving collaboration—Europe’s airports are building mobility systems that are scalable, secure, and people-first for the next era of global events. 

Strategic imperatives for Europe’s mobility future 


In Europe’s mobility transformation, leadership is not explained, it is proven. It is forged under pressure, at moments when public attention and operational demands coincide. 


1. Not stopping at milestones 

From Eurovision to the Paris Olympics to the Capitals of Culture, these are not beauty contests but real-time stress tests under global scrutiny. Each of these events must act as a live laboratory where AI-driven orchestration, intermodal coordination, and crowd modeling are tested for scalability, resilience, and adaptability. 


2. Building connectivity across the continent 

Leadership in mobility depends on interoperability across intermodal travel systems and smart airport infrastructure, not just local efficiency. The future lies in federated data infrastructures such as the Mobility Data Space, which builds on GAIA-X principles, and enables secure, sovereign data exchange between rail, air, metro, and last mile operators, for seamless Schengen travel from Arras to Athens. 


3. Activate the “3-C doctrine” 

Every decision must uncompromisingly ensure capacity, compliance, and carbon reduction. As part of Fit for 55, the targets, 2% SAF by 2025, near-zero CO₂ for new vehicles by 2035, 90% savings in the transport sector by 2050, must move from ambition to operational reality. 

 

4. Building verifiable, human-centered AI 

AI must be transparent, traceable, and monitored by humans from day one. Federated AI systems, paired with GAIA-X trust seals and human oversight, ensure that decision making is explainable and adaptable under all conditions. 


5. Making sustainability operational 

Carbon metrics need to be as visible as departure boards and as standard as ticket scanners. Dashboards for real-time emissions, predictive fuel procurement and energy-optimized infrastructure should be embedded in the operational DNA, not added as an afterthought. 

 

“Vienna has always stood at the crossroads of Europe, where culture, commerce, and connectivity meet. In 2026, when the Song Contest brings hundreds of thousands of visitors and global attention to our city, our airports will once again become a stage for Europe’s mobility promise. Such events are more than spectacles; they are live stress tests of trust, can we move millions seamlessly, sustainably, and securely? Europe’s answer must be yes. Because when capacity, compliance, and carbon reduction are orchestrated in harmony, we are not just keeping planes and people moving, we are proving that travel itself can be a model of connected humanity in the 21st century.” 

Thomas Steirer, CTO, Nagarro

At-a-glance: Capacity, Compliance, Carbon

1. “Transport accounted for around 80 % of UEFA EURO 2024’s total emissions.”
Source: Transport & Environment
2. “Starting in 2025, EU airports must include at least 2 % Sustainable Aviation Fuel (SAF) in refueling—rising to 70 % by 2050.”

Sources:  EASA (European Union Aviation Safety Agency)

3. “A dedicated MaaS app enabled integrated booking across air, rail, and metro for Paris 2024 travelers.”

Source:  UPPER (EU research project on MaaS for Paris 2024)

Perspective 

Europe has the framework, the infrastructure, and innovation. Now it has to prove itself under pressure. Each global event is more than just a showcase, it is a living audit of the European mobility promise, testing capacity, compliance, and carbon commitments in real time. 

For smart airports, these moments are the ultimate performance check. Success means more than meeting Fit for 55 targets or aligning with the EU AI Act, it means transforming regulations into operational excellence that the world can see and trust. 

If Europe’s airports can deliver seamless, safe, and sustainable travel with the world watching, they won’t just be following global standards, they'll be setting them.

european song contest 2026- Prepare the airports
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