Aspen/Pitkin County Airport Modernization Project reveals preliminary design options

The Aspen/Pitkin County Airport Modernization Project has entered the next phase of its community engagement plan at two new open houses last week, with a new survey open through the month of December. 

The open houses, which had roughly 200 people in attendance according to Pitkin County staff, introduced preliminary designs that the community will be asked to provide feedback on through December. Open house attendees were able to observe scale models of the designs and ask officials about the process.

“This is an exciting point in the public outreach and engagement process because we narrowed down to two final concepts,” said Alycin Bektesh, communications manager at Pitkin County. “We’d love the community input at this juncture because the winner is going to be what then is designed.” 

Community members who were not able to attend the open house can learn more about the designs via the survey, open through the end of December, where renders are available for participants to consider. The survey is available at the Aspen/Pitkin County Airport Modernization webpage, which can be found at aspenairport.com/modernization. 

The proposals, titled 2+ and 3+, are two different approaches to how the new Aspen/Pitkin County Airport terminal could be designed, with 2+ having a two-floor split of airport amenities and 3+ keeping everything on one floor. The two designs also have different landscaping space and options available to them. 

The survey asks participants to rank their preferences between the two concepts from a variety of viewpoints like size, flow, viewpoints, ability to interact with the space as a non-passenger, ground connectivity, and multimodality. The survey also asks participants to rank in order of importance a number of preferences on how either space should be designed — for example, whether materials are more important than views for creating a “warm and welcoming space.” 

“Now we’re seeing real mock ups of where different components of a terminal might go and this is starting to become this living, breathing, new amenity,” Bektesh said. 

Both designs appear to prioritize grand transportation connectivity and have budgeted space for bike storage, underground parking, and landscaping. 

A complete list of design materials can be found at aspenairport.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/12/Open-House-Boards-December-5-2025.pdf.