Effects of departure manager and arrival manager systems on airport capacity

At an international level, interest in airport capacity has been growing in the last few years because its maximisation ensures best performance of infrastructure. Infrastructure, procedure and human factor constraints, however, should be considered to ensure a safe and regular flow of the flights. The paper presents the values of airport capacity obtained from two methodologies: the Advisory Circular AC 150/5060-5 and the Air Traffic Optimisation (AirTOp) fast time simulator (FTS). Two scenarios have been analysed: the ‘Baseline’ scenario (ie the current procedural and infrastructural airport layout) and the ‘What if ’ scenario (ie the current layout managed with Departure MANager and Arrival MANager systems). The simpler approach of the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) advisory circular (AC) cannot model both the complex layout of the three-runway airport and the effects of planning tools. Its potential is limited to fast and preliminary analyses. Therefore, under knotty geometrical and procedural conditions, the use of aircraft delay simulation models or (FTS) models is the only tool that meets the needs of airport-management bodies. In particular, the current traffic volume of the examined airport is far from its Baseline capacity (−30 per cent) and is 40 per cent lower than the ‘What-if ’ capacity. The obtained results refer to the specific layout examined, but the pursued approach could be implemented at different airports.