Airport capacity constraints: future avenues for growth of global traffic

Abstract

Current air traffic forecasts are mainly based on the hypothesis that airports have ample capacity to accommodate future growth, or, if this is not the case, that increasing airport capacity more than marginally is possible within an acceptable time frame. Improving airport capacity more than marginally usually means adding new runways; however, especially in highly developed countries, this may take many years to complete and for some airports, it is even an insurmountable task. This paper gives a brief overview over the historic development of global air traffic and compares it with the more recent developments at specific airports, which are important hubs in the global air traffic network. Thereafter, we develop an index of airport capacity utilisation to assess the capacity reserve of an airport. This index is designed to be applied on a global level and it is based on the concepts of the 5% peak hour and the average hour of an airport which is deduced from so-called “ranking curves”, i.e. operating hours of an airport are ranked according to their traffic volume in descending order. The more this curve is inclined, the greater is the capacity reserve of an airport. This procedure is carried out for around 2,500 airports worldwide on the basis of Official Airline Guide data. The number of flights of an airport serves as a measure for its importance in the global air traffic network. In connection with the airport capacity utilisation index, we are able to categorise airports with regard to the dimensions “level of importance for the global air traffic system” and “level of capacity reserve”, thereby, we are able to identify those airports that are critical for future growth of air traffic, i.e. those airports that serve a large share of the global flight volume and at the same time have only a small capacity reserve.