Airport access and travel time uncertainty

The implications of travel time uncertainty on the operational efficiency of airport terminals have until now not been examined. With the forecast growth in congestion levels predicted for all modes of transport, not only will travel time uncertainty increase but its impact may increase also. The first part of this thesis covers the analysis of two passenger surveys conducted at Manchester Airport and Birmingham Airport. These surveys had the objective of providing evidence to support or dispute the belief that air travellers react to travel time uncertainty. The research identifies that passengers do react by allowing margins of safety for their access journeys, and that this change in behaviour will modify the arrival distribution patterns at airports. The second part of this thesis examines how airport passenger flows could be altered by a change in the arrival distribution of originating passengers at airport terminals. Three airports - Manchester, Birmingham and East Midlands International - are modelled using a simulation tool and tested to assess how a shift in arrival distribution affects queuing and peak passenger volumes within the airport terminal. The findings of this thesis show that airport passenger terminal operational efficiency is affected by access journey time uncertainty. It also identifies that passenger decision making can only be explained by various combinations of factors. Possible methods of minimising the effects of travel time uncertainty are considered. The advantages and disadvantages of access journey time uncertainty for airports and airlines are discussed. It concludes that, to be successful in overcoming negative aspects, both parties must provide a service that results in customer satisfaction. This is the only sure way to maintain their respective revenue levels and secure their future in what is becoming an increasingly competitive industry

Coupled TRNSYS-CFD simulations evaluating the performance of PCM plate heat exchangers in an Airport Terminal building displacement conditioning system

This is the post-print version of the Article. The official published version can be accessed from the link below. Copyright @ 2013 Elsevier.This paper reports on the energy performance evaluation of a displacement ventilation (DV) system in an airport departure hall, with a conventional DV diffuser and a diffuser retrofitted with a phase change material storage heat exchanger (PCM-HX). A TRNSYS-CFD quasi-dynamic coupled simulation method was employed for the analysis, whereby TRNSYS® simulates the HVAC and PID control system and ANSYS FLUENT® is used to simulate the airflow inside the airport terminal space. The PCM-HX is also simulated in CFD, and is integrated into the overall model as a secondary coupled component in the TRNSYS interface. Different night charging strategies of the PCM-HX were investigated and compared with the conventional DV diffuser. The results show that: i) the displacement ventilation system is more efficient for cooling than heating a space; ii) the addition of a PCM-HX system reduces the heating energy requirements during the intermediate and summer periods for specific night charging strategies, whereas winter heating energy remains unaffected; iii) the PCM-HX reduces cooling energy requirements, and; iv) maximum energy savings of 34% are possible with the deployment of PCM-HX retrofitted DV diffuser.This work was funded by the UK Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC), Grant No: EP/H004181/1

Civil tiltrotor missions and applications. Phase 2: The commercial passenger market

The commercial passenger market for the civil tiltrotor was examined in phase 2. A market responsive commercial tiltrotor was found to be technically feasible, and a significant worldwide market potential was found to exist for such an aircraft, especially for relieving congestion in urban area-to-urban area service and for providing cost effective hub airport feeder service. Potential technical obstacles of community noise, vertiport area navigation, surveillance, and control, and the pilot/aircraft interface were determined to be surmountable. Nontechnical obstacles relating to national commitment and leadership and development of ground and air infrastructure were determined to be more difficult to resolve; an innovative public/private partnership is suggested to allow coordinated development of an initial commercial tiltrotor network to relieve congestion in the crowded US Northeast corridor by the year 2000

Computationally Efficient Simulation of Queues: The R Package queuecomputer

Large networks of queueing systems model important real-world systems such as MapReduce clusters, web-servers, hospitals, call centers and airport passenger terminals. To model such systems accurately, we must infer queueing parameters from data. Unfortunately, for many queueing networks there is no clear way to proceed with parameter inference from data. Approximate Bayesian computation could offer a straightforward way to infer parameters for such networks if we could simulate data quickly enough. We present a computationally efficient method for simulating from a very general set of queueing networks with the R package queuecomputer. Remarkable speedups of more than 2 orders of magnitude are observed relative to the popular DES packages simmer and simpy. We replicate output from these packages to validate the package. The package is modular and integrates well with the popular R package dplyr. Complex queueing networks with tandem, parallel and fork/join topologies can easily be built with these two packages together. We show how to use this package with two examples: a call center and an airport terminal.Comment: Updated for queuecomputer_0.8.

Management of passengers & luggage flows: The impact in total time spent in airports

Airports are, like train stations, bus stops, taxi ranks, among others, places where people wait, almost always, to make a trip. However, unlike the others mentioned, the time spent at an airport whenever a passenger wants to travel, is something that has always confused me. Why it has to be so difficult and stressful flight to somewhere else and why it takes so long to perform everything in order to being able to flight always generated some doubts in me. Nowadays, and after improvements and improvements in airport logistics, a passenger can expect to go through the following processes: check-in, security control, passports (if justified), boarding, only then does the trip begin. In addition to these main processes, there are also secondary processes that also interfere with the total time spent at the airport, such as baggage sorting and even parking. It was based on my interest combined with the analysis of the processes mentioned above that I decided to carry out this dissertation. The central question that I seek to answer is: “Will it be possible to reduce the total time spent at airports through better management of passenger and baggage flows?”. Basically, my goal is to look for a solution that optimizes one of the processes mentioned above and justify how that can optimize the passenger experience. To meet the objective, I intend to study the way in which the management of passenger and baggage flows is done as well as the management of the logistics carried out at airports. Only at this stage I will be able to analyze what can be done to improve the total time spent in airports.Os aeroportos são, à semelhança de: estações de comboios, paragens de autocarro, praças de táxis entre outros, locais onde as pessoas esperam, quase sempre, com o objetivo de realizar uma viagem. Porém, ao contrário dos restantes mencionados, o excessivo tempo que é gasto em aeroportos sempre que um passageiro quer viajar foi algo que sempre me despertou interesse. O porquê de a realização de todos os processos necessários antes de viajar de avião levar tanto tempo e fazer com que na maioria dos casos, o passageiro ter que estar várias horas antes da viagem no aeroporto é algo que sempre me gerou dúvidas. Hoje em dia, e depois de muitas melhorias e inovações na logística de aeroportos a todos os níveis, um passageiro pode esperar ter que passar pelos seguintes processos: check-in, controlo de segurança, controlo de passaportes (caso se justifique), embarque e só então se inicia a viagem. Para além destes processos principais, há ainda processos secundários que interferem também no tempo total despendido no aeroporto, por exemplos a triagem de bagagens e até o estacionamento. Foi com base no meu interesse por este tema aliado à análise dos processos mencionados anteriormente que decidi realizar esta dissertação. A pergunta central que procuro responder é: “Será possível diminuir o tempo total despendido em aeroportos através de uma melhor gestão de fluxos de passageiros e de bagagens?”. No fundo, o meu objetivo é procurar uma solução que otimize qualquer um dos processos previamente mencionados e justificar como isso pode otimizar a experiência do passageiro. Para alcançar o referido objetivo, pretendo estudar ao pormenor a forma como a gestão dos fluxos de passageiro e bagagens é feita atualmente bem como a gestão logística de todos os processos que se realizam nos aeroportos. Só assim poderei analisar que melhorias podem ser feitas e em que fase da operação

Using Hybrid Simulation/Analytical Queueing Networks to Capacitate USAF Air Mobility Command Passenger Terminals

The objective of this study is to model operations at an airport passenger terminal to determine the optimal service capacities at each station given estimated passenger flow patterns and service rates. The central formulation is an open Jackson queueing network that can be applied to any USAF Air Mobility Command (AMC) terminal regardless of passenger type mix and flow data. A complete methodology for analyzing passenger flows and queue performance of a single flight is produced and then embedded in a framework to analyze the same for multiple departing flights. Queueing network analysis (QNA) is used because no special software license or methodological training is required, results are obtained in a spreadsheet model with computational response times that are instantaneous, and data requirements are substantially reduced compared with discrete-event simulation (DES). However, because of the assumptions of QNA, additional research contributions were required. First, arrivals of passengers are time-dependent, not steady-state. Theoretical results for time-dependent queue networks in the literature are limited, so a method for using DES to adjust for arrival time-dependency in QNA is developed. Second, beyond quality of service in the network, a key performance measure is the percentage of passengers who do not clear the system by a fixed time. To populate the QNA mean value system sojourn time, DES is used to develop a generic sojourn time probability distribution. All DES computations have been pre-calculated off-line in this thesis and complete a hybrid DES/QNA analytical model. The model is exercised and validated through analysis of the facility at Hickam AFB, which is currently undergoing redesign. For larger flights, adding a server at the high-utilization queues, namely the USDA inspection and security screening stations, halve system congestion and dramatically increase throughput

Airport Passenger Arrival Process: Estimation of Earliness Arrival Functions

Abstract Airport terminals are complex nodes where passengers are processed under limited capacity conditions. Congestion problems and delays are likely to occur, with negative impacts on customer satisfaction. To keep high quality levels, the knowledge of passengers' arrival patterns is a key factor. In this study, a methodology based on the use of Bar Coded Boarding Pass (BCBP) technologies has been proposed to estimate arrival rate functions for different types of passengers (Low Cost and Full Carrier passengers) and time of the day. The results obtained for a test case have been analysed and discussed

Aeronautical Engineering: A continuing bibliography with indexes, supplement 99

This bibliography lists 292 reports, articles, and other documents introduced into the NASA scientific and technical information system in July 1978