Using Lean Philosophy to Improve Passenger Departure Flow in Abu Dhabi Airport

Lean is an established process improvement philosophy to achieve the operational excellence and the benefits can be more than just improving the process. This is evident as the benefits of Lean are truly exploited in automotive, aerospace and manufacturing sectors. There are numerous implementations of Lean philosophy in service sector such as banking, higher education, software development etc. The main aim of this paper is provide an overview of Lean philosophy and explore the benefits for airport processes. The airport processes are completely different than the manufacturing and other service sectors due to the complex interlinking between different stake holders such as airline regulations, national/international law etc. This paper exemplifies the Lean philosophy by drawing examples form Passenger Departure Process (PDP) in Abu Dhabi International Airport (a major international airport). This paper starts with examining the background to the project and why airports have many characteristic features, which are fundamentally different to the manufacturing environment in which Lean was originally devised. Since its origins, Lean philosophy has been also applied to many service environments. Further, Lean philosophy is introduced and Lean principles and waste is discussed from the PDP perspective. Along this, a brief literature review is presented on the existing process improvement approaches used in the airports. The ultimate aim of the project which it has achieved was to develop a practical methodology of applying Lean principles to the PDP help airline managers and staff eliminates the waste of available resources and so increases the passenger flow through various stages of the process in line with Lean philosophy

Developing an Integrated Method of Controlling the Flow of Departing Passengers: A study of passenger departure processes at Abu Dhabi International Airport

Today, airports form a key part of global infrastructure in an increasingly globalised world. There is great competition between them to attract passengers and serve airlines in their role of transporting people regionally and internationally. Abu Dhabi International Airport is one such airport. Terminal 3 is the home of Abu Dhabi’s major carrier, Etihad Airways, one of the world’s fastest-growing international airlines. The research described in this thesis focuses on applying the Lean methodology to the passenger departure process in Terminal 3. The essential essence of ‘Lean’ is doing more with fewer resources by adopting a programme of continuous process improvement resulting in continually declining costs, mistakes and work-in-progress. The special environment of any airport, especially a major international hub made applying Lean principles difficult. This resulted from the large presence of Class I wastes or muda which could potentially change, perhaps dramatically, at short notice. This made this research significantly different from previous applications of Lean philosophy. Also, large, cumulative variations in demand set in an environment where rapid expansion of the airport is taking place also created major difficulties because of the shifting flow of passengers. Despite this, the research succeeded in achieving its aim and developed various rules from parameters based on the acronym SERVICE and an associated implementation methodology based on the Lean philosophy. Together these will help airline managers and staff to eliminate the waste of available resources and so increase passenger flow through various stages of the process in line with Lean philosophy. The research makes several important contributions to knowledge, especially in the field of Lean improvements. The contribution of this work arises from its systematic examination of the passenger departure process. The research has facilitated developing a detailed model which addresses both particular process groups and the effects of passenger class on the allocation and use of resources. This research has shown that large differences exist between the operating environment of a major international airport and those processes to which Lean principles have previously been applied. Nevertheless, despite these differences, this research has proved the Lean philosophy may be usefully applied to airport operations. Operating conditions within the passenger departure process mean that understanding the special operating environment of airports is vital. This research resulted in a discrete event simulation model of the airport much more accurate and detailed than those described in previous studies of passenger departure processes. The research then proved an improved model, which may be used experimentally to support conclusions reached from the broader application of Lean philosophy. The research observed and analysed the effects of large and cumulative peaks and troughs in demand against a background of rapid development of Abu Dhabi Airport. The researcher also evaluated the special internal and external effects on the processes, often at short notice. Consequently, there is no single ‘universal’ solution because of the major need for operational flexibility and for a close correlation between operational and strategic need. Despite these many difficulties the results of this research are a practical and straightforward series of improvements, which may be applied by airport staff themselves without need for complex computer models, simulation or dedicated experts. This will create conditions for continuously improving process performance during the passenger departure process. It will also help managers accurately identify critical areas where more radical action of increasing physical resources is needed. Finally, based on findings, the research makes several recommendations for further work

Environmental impact assessment of commercial aircraft operations in the United States

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Aeronautics and Astronautics, 2009.Cataloged from PDF version of thesis.Includes bibliographical references (p. 313-365).The objective of this thesis was to evaluate the environmental trade-offs inherent in multi-criteria objectives of an integrated environmental policy. A probabilistic multi-attribute impact pathway analysis (MAIPA) was formulated to assess the environmental damages of US commercial aircraft operations from 1991-2003. The initial contribution of this work was demonstrating the feasibility of, and identifying requirements for, the FAA Aviation-environmental Portfolio Management Tool (APMT), an integrated assessment capability for US regulatory decision-making. Non-aircraft sources have been found to dictate marginal emissions costs. The implication is that aviation emissions reductions influence neither the magnitudes nor trends in per-unit marginal damages. In contrast, noise mitigation is the dominant influence on the value of per-unit marginal damages. Trends in sum damages were found to depend on the growth rates of air transport relative to other source emissions. Growth in air transport emissions outpaced non-aircraft sources from 1991-2003. Because growth in marginal costs is nonlinear over this period, aviation emissions damages grow faster than inventories. Applying methods similar to MAIPA to estimate damages for future scenarios suggests that stemming climate impacts is fast becoming the priority. A reassessment of the environmental benefits derived from mandated phase-outs of noisy aircraft during the 1990's has been carried out. Previous studies estimated a -80% reduction in population exposure. In contrast, the reassessment estimates a ~2% reduction, providing benefits 17-20 times lower than published estimates of abatement costs.(cont.) The primary environmental benefit of the noise phase-outs was found to be related to reductions in particulate matter inventories. One way to avoid trade-off inefficiencies is to identify options that bundle benefits. This action provides such an example, where the phase-outs led to reductions in both noise and air quality emissions. Other contributions in the thesis include the following: a treatment of air transport particulate matter emissions, environmental fate, and health impacts of particulate matter; identification that the major source of reducible uncertainty in emissions damages stems from the assumed extent of ozone and particulate matter production in the engine exhaust plume; and quantification of the environmental tradeoffs in decisions specifying aircraft performance for the technology in the US commercial fleet from 1991-2003.by Stephen P. Lukachko.Ph.D