Airport System Research Articles

Yardstick Regulation in a Competitive Context? The Case of the Italian Airports

Over the past years, airport regulation has been generating a lot of interest in Europe, and despite the passing of Airport Charges Directive in 2009, there is ongoing debate on the need for introducing tighter airport regulations. The aim of the paper is twofold. First, acknowledging that regulation is usually applied in markets where competition is weak or absent, we evaluate the ex-ante need for price regulation in the air transport industry. By focusing on the Italian airport industry, our analysis provides evidence of a high level of competitive pressure faced by airports (both inside and outside the industry), suggesting that tighter price regulation may not be the optimal solution. Second, assuming that stricter regulation of the airport industry is necessary, we empirically investigate the applicability of yardstick regulation to the Italian airport system, outlining critical challenges and issues that may arise when applying benchmarking techniques in setting the optimum level of efficiency at regulated airports. According to current literature, applicability of empirical benchmarking techniques requires some basic research requirements to be met, such as high-quality data, a homogeneous production function, and a sufficient number of comparable observations. We find that both heterogeneity and the relatively small number of comparable airports, along with the complexity of gathering proper data, may compromise the applicability of a regulation scheme based on yardstick principles at the national level.

A Comparative Study on Flight Delay Networks of the USA and China

Recent studies have characterized the structures of air transport network in different countries and regions using complex network metrics. These studies coincided with the trend of increasingly available large empirical flight datasets that enable researchers to investigate the dynamics of the system, such as the propagation of flight delay. However, linking network structure with network dynamics remains a challenging task. In this paper, we proposed a method to construct flight delay networks from operational data. We provided a detailed comparison of the key structural properties of the flight delay networks in the United States and China. The comparisons of betweenness centrality of delay networks and flight networks show the advantage of the proposed method. We further found that airports in similar geographical locations do exhibit similar delay patterns in both countries. To explore the underlying mechanisms, the Multifractal Detrended Fluctuation Analysis (MF-DFA) is applied to the flights’ delay time series at both the airport level and network level. Singularity spectra analyses reveal the fundamental characteristics of the airport systems and air transportation system. Our findings contribute to the understanding of structure and dynamics of air transportation systems.

Building Information Modeling Implementation Framework for Smart Airport Life Cycle Management

Connectivity is key in this new era of smart infrastructure. Smart airports utilize new connected technologies to improve end-user experience while ensuring operational feasibility in aeronautical and non-aeronautical segments. The increasing need for digitizing the design-build-operate life cycles of airports can be met by implementing building information modeling (BIM) that enables accessing, managing, utilizing, and connecting physical and operational data in a digital collaborative environment. This study investigates the current state of practice in airport BIM (ABIM) and the use of ABIM processes in digital airport operations and maintenance by connecting existing data sources and integrating smart airport systems. The study proposes a comprehensive and adaptive ABIM management framework that depicts the alignment and connectivity of ABIM processes, resources and stakeholders with airport operational requirements by identifying gaps in the industry and literature, and developing a global understanding in ABIM visions. Research data are collected through literature and industry review, online surveys, and semi-structured interviews with aviation professionals. Mixed methods including non-parametric statistical analysis and qualitative analysis are used to determine the elements of the framework. Model-based systems engineering (MBSE) principles and language are used to generate the framework. For framework validation, a proof of concept (POC) is conducted by development and deployment of a web-based application. The developed ABIM framework is expected to guide major airport stakeholders in their BIM implementation processes to enhance airport operational efficiencies and in strategizing digital initiatives on a connected-BIM platform.

Proposal of an Airport Pavement Maintenance Management System for Cape Verde

In order to ensure safe and efficient operation of aircrafts, airport operators are faced with the need to maintain airport runway, taxiway and apron pavements in good condition, within a given budget. In this context, this paper describes the first developments and the methodological approach of a doctoral work with the following objectives: to improve and validate in-vehicle technique for pavement inspection using GNSS, video image capture and Geographic Information System, increasing the degree of automation of pavement distress identification; to develop a procedure for the definition of preventive maintenance strategies for airport pavements, adapted to Cape Verde airport system, using modelling techniques to predict pavement performance and definition of service and trigger levels; and also to develop or calibrate an existing computer application that can be used as a decision support tool.

Operational concept and validation of a new airport low-level wind information system

AbstractPilots are sometimes not provided with sufficient information to avoid go-arounds or other operational disruptions that result from low-level wind disturbances. We identified issues with existing windshear alerting systems and developed three types of airport low-level wind information systems to enhance pilot situational awareness of wind conditions by providing landing aircraft with quantitative and visualised wind information for ultimately mitigating air service disruptions due to low-level wind disturbances. The three systems, Airport Low-level Wind Information (ALWIN) and Low-level Turbulence Advisory System (LOTAS), both of which use Doppler radar/lidar, and Sodar-based Low-level Wind Information (SOLWIN), which uses Doppler SOnic Detection And Ranging (SODAR), have different costs and capabilities that allow the most cost-effective system to be selected for an airport according to its scale and local weather characteristics. This paper presents the operational concepts of our newly developed airport low-level wind information systems and describes their validation.

The Federal Aviation Administration Airport Improvement Program: Who Benefits?

The objective of the (U.S.) Federal Aviation Administration Airport Improvement Program (AIP) is “to help in developing a nationwide system of public-use airports that meets the current needs and the projected growth of civil aviation” (FAA 2002). Despite its importance to airports, academic study of the program – its effect, benefits, and deficiencies - has been limited. This paper explores funding decisions in light of AIP grantee characteristics using a regression analysis. It is suggested that the decision-making apparatus supporting the AIP program does not clearly take into consideration current needs, or the projected growth of civil aviation.

Expanding airport capacity of cities under uncertainty: Strategies to mitigate congestion

Airport capacity constraints are increasingly challenging the growth of air traffic. At the same time, decision-making about airport capacity investments is extremely complex, involving trade-offs. This paper’s objective is to optimise a privately owned airport system’s capacity investment decision in a city under demand uncertainty. Next to the investment size, our real options model incorporates the timing of the investment, as well as the cost of congestion. The results reveal that the larger a city’s initial airport capacity, the smaller its investment will relatively be and the lower the occupancy rate threshold at which investment will take place. We also show that, in case of a higher demand growth combined with more demand uncertainty, the city will benefit from a significantly larger investment, but made later at a higher occupancy rate. In this case, cities with a small initial capacity will sometimes even more than double current capacity. Higher airport charges and an increase in non-aeronautical revenues both lead to a later investment in more capacity, due to the increased project attractiveness. An increase in congestion costs results in a larger investment made earlier, in order to eliminate delays. Airport operational cost and capacity holding cost increases both lead to smaller investments.

Persistent and temporary inefficiency in airport cost function: An application to Italy

Abstract We study an airport cost function with a four-random components stochastic frontier model that split the inefficiency in two parts: (1) persistent (long-run) and (2) temporary (short-run). We analyze as determinant of both inefficiency types several exogenous factors such as the airport ownership and LCCs share. We apply the model to the Italian airport system during the period 2010–15. We find that (1) average total cost inefficiency is 14%, and that a it is mainly due to temporary inefficiency, (2) that work load units have the largest cost–output elasticity (+0.31%), (3) that price of airport services has the largest cost-input elasticity (+0.50%) while labor has a +0.41% cost elasticity and capital only a +0.09% cost elasticity. There is also evidence of economies of scale. Moreover we find that LCCs reduce both types of inefficiency and that private airports are more cost efficient than public ones. These findings have interesting managerial (e.g., strictly monitoring service costs, expand LCCs flights) and policy (e.g., provide incentive to reduce temporary inefficiency, push airport privatization) implications.

Modelling regional accessibility to airports using discrete choice models: An application to a system of regional airports

Abstract In this paper, we analyse residents' decisions regarding airport access mode in Apulia, a relatively peripheral multi-airport region in Italy. Both revealed and stated preferences data are used to estimate probabilistic demand models. The results are employed to calculate the relevant elasticities, separately for airport users and non-users, with respect to dedicated existing and planned/potential public transport services. We measure the effectiveness of specific policies/actions aimed at generating a shift from private modes (car and taxi) towards public transport, rationalising mobility towards the existing airports. Accessibility is one of the key factors in airports' provision, and an efficient public transport system might represent both an alternative to opening “local” – often costly and inefficient – airports in the same catchment area and a means to exploit economies of scale aggregating demand for existing airports.

ПРОБЛЕМЫ ИНТЕГРАЦИИ НА ЕДИНОЙ ПЛАТФОРМЕ ТЕХНИЧЕСКИХ СРЕДСТВ И СИСТЕМ ПО ОБЕСПЕЧЕНИЮ БЕЗОПАСНОСТИ АЭРОПОРТОВ И ПУТИ ИХ РЕШЕНИЯ

The problems of integrating airport security tools and systems on a single platform are considered. The main problems and ways of their solution have been identified. The analysis of the problems and methods of ensuring aviation security has been made. It is aimed to establish the direction of scientific and methodological foundations of the dynamic integration of aviation security tools of the airport.

Impact Analysis of Demand Management on Runway Configuration in Metroplex Airports

Congestion in airports and metroplexes is increasingly becoming a key bottleneck in the global air transport system. It is largely due to inefficient utilization of runway resources and its consequences of imbalance between demand and capacity. Existing studies mainly focus on runway configuration in a single airport system, and little consideration is given to the impact of demand management on runway configuration in metroplexes. Therefore, this paper proposes a methodology and assessment framework for runway configuration with a focus on the exploitation of multiple active runways in metroplex airports. The primary innovation is an integrated runway configuration management formulation with air traffic demand management options. The first is static and dynamic runway configuration management models featuring three optimization objectives, four cases of demand-capacity imbalance, three air traffic demand management options and three assessment scenarios, for eleven priority settings. The second is an efficient multi-objective evolutionary algorithm with a mechanism of objective-guided individual selection, which can obtain close-to optimal solutions with a very low computational cost within 6 seconds. Computational experiments for the real-world case of the Shanghai metroplex airports show that, the inducing strategy of minimizing the total number of adjusted flights is the best mechanism for making satisfactory tradeoffs among multiple objectives in dynamic runway configuration. The proposed model reduces the total number of adjusted flights by an average of 36% compared with the baseline static runway configuration management. Furthermore, unlike the conventional approach of giving priority to arriving aircraft, a higher priority for departures is more effective in enhancing the performance of runway systems and reducing the number of adjusted flights. The proposed framework can be applied at pre-tactical (e.g., one-day planning) as well as tactical (e.g., several-hours rolling horizon) levels.

THE INFLUENCE OF RESILIENCE AND SUSTAINABILITY PERCEPTION ON AIRPORT BRAND PROMOTION AND DESIRE TO REUSE OF AIRPORT SERVICES: THE CASE OF IRAN AIRPORTS

Sustainability and resilience are important in social, economic and environmental aspects. However, inspections show that in developing countries like Iran, sustainability and resilience strategies lose their significance when economic problems and high workload come to matter. This research tries to determine what factors encourage managers to consider airport sustainability in long-term and different situations. Such investigations are essential for a developing country like Iran, which has 54 airports under a central management system, which can help deploying selected strategies. Results of this study show that if passengers perceive the sustainability activities and ethical cores of an airport, they consider it more prestigious and become willing to reuse airport services for their future travels. They also turn out as evangelists and changes of the way people travel becomes visible on a wider scale. This can help managers to understand recent travel behaviour of airport passengers and enhance the airports’ performance considering different aspects equally, which are profitable for airport system, public and environment as a whole.

Examining airline ground operation incidents by airport size

Evaluating ground operations incidents is a critical step for airlines from both a management and safety perspective. Analysis of incidents is useful in both safety management and in planning for training and recurrent training of airline employees. De-identified data was provided by a major U.S. airline for all reported ground operations incidents from 2010-2017. This ex post facto research examined the rate of ground operations incidents by airport size for this airline, using both the National Plan of Integrated Airport Systems (NPIAS) classification and the airline's classification of airport size, based on its operations at each airport. NPIAS recognizes all commercial, reliever, and public airports in the national airport system, and the airports in this study were all classified as small/non-hub, or large/medium hub. The airline's size classification was based on its operations at a given airport and assigned airports as small, medium, large, or mega stations. The analysis of ground operations showed that the rate of incidents per operations did not differ with airport size for either the NPIAS size categories or the airline's size classification.

An explorative analysis to identify airport business models

This paper develops a framework based on the strategic management and airport literature, that contextualizes the analysis and measurement of business models in the airport industry. The applicability and usefulness of this framework for interpreting the core logic through which airports create value is then assessed for the Italian airport system, using a cluster analysis on all 45 Italian commercial airports and a total of eight indicators reflecting dimensions of, and questions about, the business model framework. This paper promotes a more structured and comprehensive investigation of the strategic approach of modern airports, viewed as diversified and profit-oriented companies, and paves the way for further empirical analysis aimed at identifying characteristics influencing business model composition and the relationship between business models and airport performance.

Evaluation of energy saving potential of HVAC system by operation data with uncertainties

Measurement uncertainties exist widely in the operation of HVAC system. If they are not taken into account, the evaluation results may be inaccurate. Therefore, the paper proposes a novel evaluation method based on exergy analysis, which considers measurement uncertainties of operation data. The evaluation method quantifies the uncertainties of the real exergy efficiency and the real ideal exergy efficiency of HVAC system by Latin hypercube sampling (LHS) and particle swarm optimization (PSO) algorithm, and set up an evaluation benchmark and an evaluation index Iprop to evaluate the energy saving potential of HVAC system. The evaluation benchmark is the probability distributions of real ideal exergy efficiency, and the evaluation index Iprop is defined as the ratio of the expectation of the real exergy efficiency to the expectation of the real ideal exergy efficiency. An airport HVAC system which is located in the south of China is used for validation. The proposed evaluation method is compared with a conventional evaluation method on the simulation model under two levels of uncertainties. Results show that the proposed evaluation method is more accurate and credible than the conventional evaluation method under uncertainties.

Improving maintenance quality in airport baggage handling operations

Purpose: The findings of a recent study at Heathrow are presented. The objective of the study was an operational quality issue with the baggage reclaim process and addressed the problem of unexpected downtime of baggage carousels during operational hours. For airlines and airports, the reclaim carousel is a key element in the process whereby passengers decide about the quality of their journey. Failure that leads to longer waiting times or even the relocation of baggage to another carousel results in passenger dissatisfaction and therefore needs to be avoided. The current regime of ‘time-based’ or ‘preventative’ maintenance can be classified as ‘run-to-break’ or ‘reactive’, causing frequent and costly downtime. A novel condition-based monitoring method to improve the reliability of the time-critical baggage reclaim process is described. Reclaim carousel maintenance quality was improved by the development of innovative condition-based maintenance systems designed to meet the requirements of twenty-first century airport systems and Industry 4.0 in cooperation with Siemens DF (digital factory) and their internet of things (IoT) platform Mindsphere. Methodology: A technical action research approach was undertaken at one of the biggest capital airport baggage handling systems in Europe. From June 2016 a condition monitoring pilot system on one operational carousel was established using engineering cycle theory. A solution was designed, installed, continually monitored and the results discussed with practitioners from the operation and maintenance (O&M) department. Root cause analysis was used to identify reasons for abrasive wear, followed by failure simulations during operation. Technical vibration data was collected so that an adequate condition monitoring system could be developed and optimised that improved the maintenance quality of reclaim carousels and reduced the costs associated with unexpected failure of the baggage handling system. Findings: Run-to-break maintenance is never conducive to quality maintenance and control and results in great uncertainty and unreliability. Meeting the objective of improving quality was difficult because the assets are hidden and baggage carousels are in constant use; however using wireless beacon technology it was possible to identify what problems might occur and when. Using the cloud-based IoT and Airport 4.0 also necessitated many sophisticated checks and measures, which are now in development. This study highlights the value of changing from the antiquated ‘run to break’ maintenance of hidden assets in airport baggage handling carousels to high-quality maintenance through the use of condition monitoring using wireless vibration sensors linked to a cloud-based IoT ecosystem. Originality/Value: With this solution in operation, maintenance quality has been approved and heavy damage can be avoided. The solution addresses problems caused by a variety of hidden equipment needing the highest possible maintenance quality. It can instantly secure the best quality of service for critical assets in an operation that cannot afford any unplanned downtime.

Acceptance of biometric technology in airport check-in

Airport operators have been constantly searching for different ways to improve operational indicators, as well as to increase the quality of services offered to airport passengers. Therefore, changes are required in airport planning, either in its master plan or operational improvement. In this context, we highlight airport technology, which increasingly contrbutes for changes in the airport system. Besides, airport technology is being introduced at airports to provide passengers with faster, safer and more efficient processing in order to contribute to a better airport performance. However, existing knowledge on innovation to enhance passengers experience is limited. This study contributes to fill this gap by analyzing the possibility of airport passengers to use biometric technology. Different types of airport technology, which are being developed to offer passengers a faster, smother, safer and more efficient process, are in the spotlight. This paper discusses the likelihood to use biometric technology in check-in procedures, technology non-existent in Brazilian airports, through discrete choice model, specifically the binomial logit. Using a database of 760 passengers interviewed at three different Brazilian airports, the results showed that 82.94% of passengers would use this new technology.

Analisis Data ADS-B untuk Menentukan Probability of Target Report pada Sistem A-SMGCS

A-SMGCS is an airport system that is used to improve the efficiency of using runways, apron and taxiways by maximizing runway capacities in all situations and weather while maintaining the required level of security. One of the parameters that becomes a requirement in the A-SMGCS system is the Probabillity of Target Report (PTR) whose value must be greater or equal to 95% in the area maneuver with update rate of the data one second [1]. Automatic Dependent SurveillanceBroadcast (ADS-B) is one of the cooperative sensors in the A-SMGCS system. The ADS-B sensor is a receiver that is used to capture ADS-B data from aircraft or vehicles equipped with ADS-B transmitters. The amount of ADSB data received by the ADS-B receiver and is needed for the A-SMGCS system is one of the factors that determine the Probability of Target Report (PTR). This paper will test three ADS-B receivers which will be selected for use as a cooperative sensor in the next A-SMGCS development. From the results of analysis and retrieval of data obtained by Radarcape ADS-B receiver more suitable for the development of the A-SMGCS system.

Identifying drug couriers in airports

With the goal of understanding and combating the transportation of narcotics through airport systems, this paper provides a descriptive analysis of how drug couriers move through airports and the behaviours associated with their doing so. Utilising the expertise of veteran courier interdiction subject matter experts, the authors catalogued 69 distinct behaviours in seven topic categories. These include ticket characteristics, luggage characteristics, general behaviours, deceptive behaviours, verbal behaviours, nonverbal behaviours and group behaviours. These behavioural indicators are situated within eight sub-environments. Developing an understanding of the unique context of airport environments is essential to assessing behaviour and using behavioural cues to identify the concealed transportation of drugs and money by individuals or groups. This represents a skill set relevant to security and law enforcement personnel protecting transportation systems.

Quality and Reliability Engineering in Service Industry: A Proposed Alternative Improvement Framework

Quality and reliability engineering technique are widely used as improvement tools in manufacturing industries, involving the design experiments, quality function deployment (QFD), and survival analysis, focuses on improving the lifecycle of products. However, started at early last decade, some researches in improving the service lifecycle in some service industry consider to implements design of experiment in service industry, followed by other tools such as QFD, and the reliability engineering tools. This research proposed alternatives incorporated quality and reliability engineering methods in evaluating and improving the lifecycle of service. Starting with evaluating the weaknesses of service using SERVQUAL method, finding the improvement plan by implementing QFD, designing the robust service design using Taguchi designed experiment methods, and then implementing survival analysis for ensuring the reliability of designed services. This framework has successfully implemented in designing and evaluating existing airport service system with some recommendation generated in.