Optimal assignment of airport baggage unloading zones to outgoing flights

The outbound airport baggage handling system (BHS) consists of a set of unloading zones (chutes) which are assigned to outgoing flights. Airport baggage operations have inherent uncertainties such as flight delays and varying number of bags. In this paper, the chute assignment problem is modeled as a Stochastic Vector Assignment Problem (SVAP) and multiple extensions are presented to incorporate the various design needs of the airport. A real airport outbound BHS is presented. This case study also guided the optimization models’ design process. The performance of the optimization models is compared with the methods used in practice and literature.     

On load balancing strategies for baggage screening at airports

We study load balancing policies for an airport baggage handling system (BHS). The performance of the screening subsystem is important as it can potentially cause traffic congestion of the whole BHS during peak period. Currently, the round-robin (RR) and the first-available (FA) polices are implemented at airports. This paper presents a simulative approach to evaluate the impact of load balancing policies on the system performance. Using discrete-event simulations, airport practitioners can assess the effectiveness of the policies according to the actual layout of a particular passenger terminal. In addition to the RR and FA, a join-shortest-queue (JSQ) policy is introduced. This scheme can be applied jointly with the RR for daily operations. A case study is presented to illustrate the characteristics of this scheme. Simulation results demonstrate that the RR-JSQ can replace the existing RR-FA for a better balanced load distribution and improve the overall system performance.     

Airport operations and security screening: An examination of social justice

Airports are a crucial part of the United States transportation system and airport officials are continuously challenged to ensure that their operations are secure. A major part of providing airport security is implementing check points where passengers interface with the security screening system. The airlines and airport security administration receive negative publicity when passengers are mistreated at security check points. Further, these organizations spend a lot of time to assess the situation and take corrective actions. This study examines passenger perceived bias and the airport security screening system. Using data from a randomly selected sample of 145 airline passengers, six hypotheses are tested. The hypotheses exam the predictive relationships of control procedures, security personnel training, security personnel professionalism, and security screening systems on passenger perceived bias. Multiple regression analysis is used to test the hypotheses. The research findings indicate that security personnel professionalism is negatively and significantly related to passenger perceived bias. Also, security personnel training and security control procedures are positively and significantly related to security personnel professionalism. Management implications, limitations, and recommendations for future research are offered.     

Concession revenue and optimal airport pricing

In recent years airports have been under growing pressure to become financially self-sufficient and to pursue profit maximization in their non-aeronautical or concession operations. In this paper we examine the optimal pricing in a model where concession and aeronautical operations of an airport are considered together with an overall break-even constraint. We find that the optimum solution may require a subsidy from concession to aeronautical operations. However, such a cross-subsidy may or may not restore marginal-cost pricing on aeronautical operations. On the other hand, social welfare can be higher when an airport is allowed to make profits in concession operations than when marginal-cost pricing is imposed on concession operations.     

A systematic approach to assess the effectiveness of airport noise mitigation strategies

Regional airports are often located very close to the urban area they serve and the increasing traffic rate that many of them have experienced in the last years has produced several impacts on the communities living close to the airport area, mainly aviation noise. If not properly managed, noise impacts produced by airport operations can cut down significantly the development of airport air traffic with direct effects on the economic and territorial systems. Aeronautical noise has greatly reduced in the last decade, due to aircraft design technological improvements and more severe regulations. However, the noise reduction during a single event does not make the issue of the airport location – and then the whole noise impact – less significant. This paper proposes an assessment process to evaluate the effects of actions adopted to reduce airport noise impacts on populated areas. Both airport-related factors – such as number of take-off; day-evening-night distributions of movements; aircraft type; flying paths – and land-use characteristics have been considered and combined in a density index that synthesizes the impacts of airport noise on the territory. The assessment process has been tested on a real case, the airport of Bologna in Northern Italy. The predicted results, compared with available real data for the test case, are significant and encourage the use of the proposed assessment process as decision support system for the airport management.     

Factors influencing cargo agents choice of operations in Abuja airport,Nigeria

The ability of an airport to attract traffic can vary within a multi-airport model of operation and highly competitive environment. This study is an effort to examine the factors that cargo agents rank as most important in their choice of Abuja airport cargo transhipment operations. A questionnaire survey was conducted on a random sample of members of the Association of Nigeria Customs Licensed Agents (ANCLA) at Abuja airport for primary data collection. The study employed a combination of Factor Analysis (FA) and Multiple Linear Regression (MLR) to analyse the data collected. The results of the factor loadings indicate airport capacity, airport charges and customs efficiency as the most significant factors that agents consider in their choice of handling cargo through Abuja airport. The three variables were found to have a high correlation relationship (R = 0.802) with the dependent variable of airport choice after subjecting it to regression analysis. This serves as information to airport managers for the airport planning of capacity in cargo operations within multi-airport country such as Nigeria.     

A multi-time scale management structure for airport ground handling automation

The sustainability of air travel relies on proper and timely aircraft ground handling at airports. This research proposes a ground handling management structure which allows the automation of operations to face the growing demand for this service. It is shown how at operations level, information exchange with the airport collaborative decision-making system turns possible on-line fleet assignment to ground handling tasks. This is done by designing different heuristics for assignment of fully automated or semi-automated vehicles to ground handling tasks. Numerical results for an actual airport are presented to illustrate the potential performance of automated ground handling operations.     

Analyzing airport security checkpoint performance using cognitive agent models

Modern airports operate under high demands and pressures, and strive to satisfy many diverse, interrelated, sometimes conflicting performance goals. Airport performance areas, such as security, safety, and efficiency are usually studied separately from each other. However, operational decisions made by airport managers often impact several areas simultaneously. Current knowledge on how different performance areas are related to each other is limited. This paper contributes to filling this gap by identifying and quantifying relations and trade-offs between the detection performance of illegal items and the average queuing time at airport security checkpoints. These relations and trade-offs were analyzed by simulations with a cognitive agent model of airport security checkpoint operations. By simulation analysis a security checkpoint performance curve with three different regions was identified. Furthermore, the importance of focus on accuracy for a security operator is shown. The results of the simulation studies were related to empirical research at an existing regional airport.     

Spanish airports performance and efficiency benchmark. A PESA-AGB study

This study uses a MCDA tool to analyse and improve Spanish airports performance and efficiency. Thus, a holistic study using MACBETH (with PESA-AGB) is used. This study has never been applied before in Spanish airports. Firstly, a literature review related to this study keywords is conducted, as well as about benchmarking concept applied specifically to airports. Secondly, several methodologies in used to benchmark airports are reviewed and compared. Thirdly, airport performance and efficiency issues are addressed and described. Finally, the MCDA-MACBETH (with PESA-AGB) tool is applied to 4 Spanish airports.Spanish airports belonging to AENA transported 263, 753, 406 passengers in 2018 with an increase compared to 2017 of 5.8%. General data enables to conclude that.Spanish air transportation system is growing annually and hence there is the need to improve airports performance and efficiency, also to maintain the high levels of quality to address the growing demand. Spanish air transportation system is growing annually and is it upmost important to maintain high levels of quality to address such demand. Through this study, performance and efficiency improvements are seek within several airport key areas such as Safety and Security, Quality Service, Productivity and Effectiveness, Financial and Environment.     

Efficiency thresholds and cost structure in Senegal airports

This paper assesses airport efficiency levels in Senegal under a stochastic environment where the satisficing concept for different performance thresholds is applied. A two-stage satisficing DEA-Support Vector Machine approach is used here to compute the impacts of cost structure on these thresholds. In the first stage, within the ambit of the satisficing DEA model, the probabilities of achieving a minimal performance threshold are computed in a stochastic fashion. In the second stage, Support Vector Machine regression is used to discriminate between high/low efficiency groups within a given performance threshold. This methodology was sufficiently robust to handle small samples. The results reveal that the cost of capital and the cost of labor are the cost structure variables that have the greatest impact on efficiency levels, besides cargo operations.     

A tentative analysis of the impacts of an airport closure

This paper identifies the vulnerabilities of operations at Heathrow airport to a short airport closure. The system disruptions assessed are delays, flight rerouting or diversions to alternate airports, and flight cancellations. In addition, the impact on fuel consumption, and hence CO₂ emissions, is quantified using the Reorganized Air Traffic Control Mathematical Simulator Plus simulation model and the Advanced Emission Model tool. The results have implications for assessing how increased severe weather events associated with climate change may disrupt airport operations.     

Analytic hierarchy process approach for identifying relative importance of factors to improve passenger security checks at airports

Many failures concerned with detecting prohibited items from air passenger or carry on luggage have been reported from time to time even in advanced countries. The objective of this research is to study the relative importance of the means to improve passenger security checks at the airport. The authors recognize that there are three major factors affecting the effectiveness of passenger screening: human resources, equipment and facilities, and procedures and responsibility structures. The study utilized an AHP analysis on surveyed data about the relative importance of the factors and elements concerned with the improvement of passenger screening. The result of the analytic hierarchy process analysis showed that the most important factor that would need improvement to raise the performance of passenger screening would be human resources. This result is compatible with the globally accepted assertion held by others in the aviation world.     

Probabilistic assessment of fleet-level noise impacts of projected technology improvements

Demand projections for civil aviation have forecast increases in operations in future decades. Increases in demand are beneficial to the growth and advancement of the aviation industry, but also come with the threat of significant increase in environmental impacts. In response, the industry is focusing on programs to develop technologies for reductions in fuel burn, NO_x emissions, and noise. While aircraft-level impacts are an obvious metric of success, it is difficult to make informed robust technology investment decisions with respect to noise without understanding the fleet-level impacts. Fleet-level predictions of noise for technology explorations are especially complicated because it is computationally expensive, highly combinatorial, and airport-specific. Recently, rapid automated airport noise models have been developed, which can be simulated using Design of Experiments (DOE). The results of these simulations are used to generate surrogate models for airport noise contour area, which can be summed to yield a fleet-level impact. These models make use of simplifying assumptions to provide estimates of airport-level noise that are substantially cheaper to compute. They can be used to perform parametric trade-off analyses in conjunction with the equivalency assumption. Equivalency asserts that environmental impacts of a technology infused aircraft can be represented by scaled operations of the baseline aircraft in the same class. This simple assumption allows for the modeling of technology and market penetration factors under the same units: operations. This research uses surrogate models in conjunction with the equivalency assumption to examine two potential technology scenarios in a target forecast year, simulating technology and market performance factors to identify vehicle classes that could have the greatest impact in reducing contour area. Results show that technology and market performance of future notional Small Single Aisle and Large Single Aisle vehicle aircraft have the highest positive correlations with potential reductions in contour area.     

Measuring total factor productivity of airports— an index number approach

There is an increasing trend towards corporatisation and privatisation of airports in an effort to improve performance. However, the normal financial reporting requirements associated with these forms of organisation are not sufficient indicators of the performance of airports since profitability can be more a function of the exercise of market power than a sign of productive efficiency. Also, there are concerns that efforts to regulate the prices charged by airports can result in under-investment and declining service standards. This makes it important to monitor the cost-efficiency, cost-effectiveness and service-effectiveness of airports. There is a growing literature on these topics, but so far there has been little attempt to apply the concepts of total factor productivity to the airport sector. We use a non-parametric index number method to illustrate how such a global measure can be used to investigate the role of disaggregated performance measures that often are very useful to managers and to those monitoring airport operations.     

Improving US airport taxicab services through governance arrangements

Most airports internationally have implemented customer satisfaction programs into their operations to increase non-aeronautical revenues. In the US, taxicabs are an essential airport transport mode given the limited public transport options available. Effective airport taxicab planning efforts can increase airport customer satisfaction levels, as well as facilitate handling increased airport passenger volumes. However, little is known on how US airports have adapted their governance practices from a traditional hierarchical to a network approach in their efforts to undertake airport taxicab planning initiatives since the deregulation of the transportation industry. Data acquired from 51 US hub airports is used to examine their existing taxicab planning practices. The findings offer how US airports can modify governance processes in their airport taxicab planning processes to better support increases in the customer satisfaction levels of airport taxicab patrons.     

A methodology for establishing operational standards of airport passenger terminals

This paper discusses a methodology for establishing the operational standards of service performance of airport passenger terminals using a perception–response model. The proposed approach is defined by the graphical representation of passengers’ collective attitudes towards the range of operational service at an airport passenger terminal. It adopts new concepts to establish service standards through a special survey to better interpret terminal operations and service level at each facility. It is expressed in terms of passengers’ perception of various service levels and their response to the respective service conditions. The methodology may provide practical service standards of airport terminals and prove to be a practical and convenient technique to airport planners, designers, consultants, operators, and airport managers.     

Real estate,factory outlets and bricks: A note on non-aeronautical activities at commercial airports

This note considers the degree of complementarity of non-aviation activities to airside activities at airports in relation to airport governance and regulation. A simple economic model of airport operations is employed to draw the distinction between complementary and non-complementary non-aviation activities by airports and the effect of these activities on aeronautical prices and competition.     

Airport selection criteria of low-cost carriers: A fuzzy analytical hierarchy process

The selection of airport is an important consideration for low-cost carriers (LCCs) to remain cost competitive. The objective of this study is to identify and rank the airport selection criteria of LCCs. Based on reviewing the existing literature, five main factors comprising 16 sub-factors were developed. The factors were first validated by three industry experts from the aviation industry. Thereafter, a survey questionnaire requiring a comparison of the factors was administered on 28 executives who were involved in the strategy planning and formulation of LCCs based in China or Korea. The collected data were analysed using fuzzy analytical hierarchy process (FAHP). In descending order of their importance, the main factors influencing LCCs' selection of airport are (1) airport charges, (2) airport performance, (3) airport growth opportunities, (4) catchment area and (5) airport infrastructure. The top three sub-factors are airport costs, demand for LCC services and passenger throughput. The research contributes to academic research by providing a holistic assessment of the key considerations influencing LCCs' selection of airport. In addition, it implicates policy formulation of LCCs by providing a framework for assessment of airports that are suitable for LCCs’ operations.     

The effects of use agreements on airport efficiency

Bilateral contracting is integral to the working relationship between airports and airlines. In the U.S., the three common types of airport use agreements are the residual method, the compensatory method, and the hybrid method. Under a residual agreement, the financial risk of the host airport is borne by the signatory airlines, and in return, the signatory airlines pay reduced user fees. Under a compensatory agreement, however, airports bear their own financial risks in the absence of a signatory airline. A hybrid agreement combines the features of residual and compensatory agreements. For example, under a hybrid agreement, airports usually bear their own financial risks in terminal operations while the signatory airlines take over the financial risks in airfield operations. The aim of this paper is to determine whether these three types of business agreements affect airport operational efficiency. Using 2009 to 2016 yearly data of 59 U.S. hub airports, we find that airports with residual-type agreements tend to have lower operational efficiency. This implies that, although under a residual agreement, the signatory airlines pay favorable airport fees and charges, increased airport inefficiency may undercut any potential benefits of the agreement.     

Marketing innovation: Sources,capabilities and consequences at airports in Europe's peripheral areas

This paper investigates sources, capabilities and consequences of marketing innovation at airports in Europe's peripheral areas. A questionnaire-based survey was administered to airport managers. Ten sources of airport marketing innovation are identified. Innovation is significantly higher at airports that are administered as an independent entity compared to airports that are administered as part of a regional or national airport system. Large airports have a significantly higher level of innovation compared to small airports. Innovation has a significant positive effect on airport marketing performance, irrespective of the strategic focus of the airport.