Abstract
With the air transport industry developing dramatically, the problem of flight congestion in the terminal area (TMA) has been aggravated. Particularly for arrival aircraft, the extraholding and delay not only increase the workload of air traffic controllers and aircrew but also reduce the operational efficiency. To struggle with this issue, it is crucial to study how to improve the operational efficiency of arrival aircraft. Under the background of the rapid promotion of Point Merge (PM) procedure program in the busy TMAs in the world, this paper firstly combines the optimization of PM procedure and arrival aircraft sequencing, aiming to maximize the operational benefits of arrival aircraft in TMA. Firstly, the framework of the PM procedure is set up to replace the traditional approach route known as Standard Instrument Arrival (STAR). After that, the PM procedure optimization model is established to provide a better approach route for each arrival aircraft. Then for a flow of arrival traffic, an aircraft sequencing model is established to readjust the landing sequence of arrival aircraft, thus further improving the operational benefits of arrival aircraft. Finally, taking the TMA of Shanghai Hongqiao International Airport as the case, we compare the impact of different flight procedures and different landing sequences on the operational benefits of arrival aircraft. The experimental results show that the application of the PM procedure optimization model and sequencing model can effectively improve the operational benefits on the premise of ensuring safety, thus realizing the safe and orderly approach in TMA.
Highlights
From 2015 to 2019, the civil aviation industry in China has witnessed rapid development, the total turnover of transportation has been increasing, and the annual growth rate has been kept above 5% [1].the rapid development of the air transport industry has caused a series of impacts on terminal area (TMA)
Compared with Standard Instrument Arrival (STAR), radar vector can make controllers control aircraft according to their expectations, which may increase the flexibility of control
With the soaring of traffic, radar vector leads to heavier workload of controllers due to more scattered trajectory, which may threaten the safety of flight [3]. erefore, how to strengthen the flight management in TMA and carry out a safe and effective approach has become a key problem to realize TrajectoryBased Operation (TBO) in future civil aviation [4]
Summary
From 2015 to 2019, the civil aviation industry in China has witnessed rapid development, the total turnover of transportation has been increasing, and the annual growth rate has been kept above 5% [1]. Liang et al considered the operating environment of the TMA of Beijing Capital International Airport and adopted a new structure of PM procedure shaped like “∞” [13]. After that, they proposed a new multilayer PM path structure, which allocates the corresponding flight level to different types of aircraft lying on the same sequencing leg [14]. Erefore, this paper combines the optimization of PM procedure and arrival aircraft sequencing, aiming to maximize the operational benefits of arrival aircraft in TMA, promoting the application of PM procedure, which has great significance for the sustainable development of air transportation.
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