Chapter 4 - Airport Networks

Abstract

In this chapter, we apply the concepts of complex networks presented in the previous chapter to airport networks. Nodes of airport networks are airports and metropolitan areas, and an edge exists between any pair of nodes with at least a direct connection by air travel in the considered time window. We discuss the basic properties of the world airport network, its stability along time and its structural organisation. Then we use community detection algorithms to find regional airport networks and long-haul subnetworks. These networks represent a market segmentation of the world airport network. Then we turn to airline and alliance airport networks and alliance airport networks. We examine the differences between airline airport networks across different business models, and the emergence of global properties of airport network from aggregation of airline networks. We end the chapter by introducing air navigation networks that allow tackling air traffic management problems using complex networks theory.