Lyon-Saint Exupéry Airport rolls out the red carpet for its clients

Lyon-Saint Exupéry Airport has just unveiled its brand-new Welcome Zone, a 165m², open-plan area designed for a sole purpose: to welcome travellers to the Rhône-Alpes region and showcase all that it has to offer them. Expert advisors and innovative multimedia provide tourists, of whom almost a third are international arrivals, with all the information they could need on the local area, transport links, and airport services. Open from 6am until 11pm, with an additional 24-hour interactive information point, the Welcome zone is divided into three key areas: the Tourism & Airport zone, the Lounge space, and the Transport zone. Each zone has been tailor-designed by AVANT-GARDE and created by STEL, a subsidiary of Vinci Construction, to offer a contemporary, elegant look and feel.

Discover the new Welcome Zone: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vU0e0q6Erng&feature=youtu.be

Expert advisors and innovative multimedia provide tourists with all the information they could need on the local area, transport links, and airport services

Tourism & Airport: a hot spot for information on the region and the airport

The Tourism & Airport zone concentrates on providing visitors with useful information and advice about services within the airport and those available to them as they continue their holiday in the region. Expert advisors are on hand at an ergonomically-designed, welcoming counter from 6am until 11pm. Display screens have been integrated into the existing architecture to serve as interactive signposts for passengers, and the area is decorated in vibrant colours and materials to be attractive and inviting to travellers.

Visitors can contact advisors for information on their holiday – hotel reservations, ‘city cards’, museum bookings, guided tours or cruises, directions and maps – but also for help with flight and airline information, or passengers’ practical needs. Advisors are trained by both Lyon Airports and the Rhône-Alpes Tourism and ONLYLYON Tourism and Congress tourist offices, and are experts on airport services and local tourism. As well as airport staff, travel agencies and tour operators, such as Rhône-Alpes Tourism, are present in the Welcome zone to advise passengers on their trip.

The Lounge: relax and connect

Alongside the Tourism & Airport zone and the ticket office, a Lounge area gives travellers free, independent access to tourist and airport information th anks to touch-screen tablets and a wall of digital images. The space is calm and laid-back, with warm wood and mineral-based materials echoing the architecture of the Rhône-Alpes region. The Tech Bar is equipped with touch-screen tablets packed with ideas and useful tips about the area that customers can consult at their leisure. It overlooks a relaxation area where visitors can settle down in comfort and make the most of their free time by checking out what the region has to offer, all beautifully presented on digital screens.

Transport: getting you where you want to go

The Transport ticket office provides travellers with information and tickets for public transport in the region to facilitate their onward journey. Services include regular shuttle buses to major nearby towns such as Aix-les-Bains, Grenoble or Annecy as well as to 38 ski stations during the months from December to April, with direct access to the bus station from the airport. The Rhônexpress tram gets passengers from the airport’s TGV station to central Lyon in less than 30 minutes. Even when the Welcome zone closes overnight, passengers will still have access to tourist information on the 24-hour interactive information point, where they can buy tickets for public transport and make reservations for tourist services.

The Welcome zone project, launched 18 months ago, is a unique collaboration that brings together organisations from the private and public sectors with the common objective to better welcome leisure and business travellers to the region, and encourage them to discover it for themselves. Lyon Airports, Rhône-Alpes Tourism, ONLYLYON Tourism and Congress, the Public Transport Association of Lyon-Saint Exupéry and Rhônexpress have signed an agreement lasting 7 years and 7 months.

Philippe Bernard, President of Lyon Airports: Lyon Airports has a hugely influential role in the economy of Lyon and the Rhône-Alpes region, having welcomed more than 8.5 million passengers in 2013. It is a gateway to a territory rich in business and leisure opportunities. This new area is remarkable, not only because of its original concept of centralizing all passenger information in one place, but also because of the collaboration between the prominent project partners. The Welcome zone illustrates the importance Lyon Airports places on constantly strengthening the quality of service delivered to its clients.

Jean Besson, President of Rhône-Alpes Tourism: In the face of new challenges destination managers are confronting Rhône-Alpes Tourism is becoming a services platform (marketing, training, shared content management, economical analysis and expertise…) dedicated to answering the needs of regional players. We bring together complementary areas of expertise, and this was also the goal we set when creating the Welcome zone.

Denis Trouxe, President of ONLYLYON Tourism and Congress: It was only natural that ONLYLYON Tourism and Congress be present at the airport, one of the leading gateways to the region for business and leisure travellers, both from France and abroad. The Welcome zone gives us the opportunity to make visitors feel even more welcome from the moment they step off the plane, and to promote all that the Lyon region and our partners have to offer to the 8 million people passing through the airport each year. We are delighted to be part of this collaboration with Lyon Airports and Rhône-Alpes Tourism which has given rise to the exceptional Welcome zone!

Raymond Faure, CEO of Cars Faure: Today, all the transport companies that are part of the TPLSE association offer global connected mobility at the Welcome zone, in partnership with offers from the Regional Tourism Committee and the Lyon Tourist Office. In this way anyone travelling in the Rhône Alpes region will have 24-hour access to tourist services which they can combine with various transport options. This is an ambitious project which bears witness to the capacity of local players to work together to deliver smart, added-value services, thereby strengthening the attractiveness of the Rhône-Alpes region for an international audience.

Cedric Fechter, Director of the concession company RHONEXPRESS SAS: Rhônexpress links Lyon to the city airport in less than 30 minutes, every day of the year from 5am until midnight. 1,170,000 passengers used the service in 2013, meaning 5% more people than in 2012. Rhônexpress is an essential company in the regional travel industry, ideal for those who are looking for a service that is fast, reliable, comfortable and generally customer-focused. More than a quarter of visitors who fly into Lyon Airport choose Rhônexpress to get them to the city centre; a third of those passengers are foreign. For Rhônexpress, whose primary goal is to serve the public, taking part in the creation of the Welcome zone and working with the other partners was an obvious choice.