INVESTIGATION OF THE IMPACT OF THE AIR TRAFFIC ROUTE CONFIGURATIONS ON SECTOR CAPACITY

Year 2017, Volume: 18 Issue: 5, 1031 - 1041, 31.12.2017

Mustafa Özdemir Öznur Usanmaz

https://doi.org/10.18038/aubtda.292020

Abstract

Airspace constraints and controller workload are among the
limiting factors of airspace capacity. One of these constraints is the network
structure of Air Traffic Services (ATS)
routes
which is related to the configuration of flight paths, the presence of
intersecting routes or conflict points, and the intersection angle. Improved
sector capacity can be achieved through air route network development which limits
the number of conflicts involving major traffic flows.
In order to reduce the number of conflicts, the route configurations can be
changed and merged in a single point. In this direction, two different models
have been developed through fast time simulation to measure the effect of
intersection of the unidirectional flight paths at three different points and
one point on the sector capacity. Under the specified conditions, it is
observed that the three intersecting routes at one point increased the average
delay time by 15.9 min. and decreased the capacity by 20% according to the
three intersecting routes at three different points. As a result of the study,
it is concluded that the route configurations are one of the important factors
affecting the average delay and sector capacity.

Keywords

Intersecting routes, sector capacity

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