Variations in hub service in the US domestic air transportation network

This paper looks at the various types of hubs that have evolved in the air transportation network in the USA. Since deregulation of the industry at the end of the 1970s, the major air carriers have expanded their networks to become more competitive, and the number and types of hubs have grown accordingly. A connectivity analysis using a traditional matrix approach is used to derive indices which are the basis for the development of a connectivity classification scheme. In addition, the various service functions of hubs are explored.     

COVID-19 pandemic and air transportation: Successfully navigating the paper hurricane

This paper aims to analyze and understand the impact of the corona virus disease (COVID-19) on aviation and also the role aviation played in the spread of COVID-19, by reviewing the recent scientific literature. We have collected 110 papers on the subject published in the year 2020 and grouped them according to their major application domain, leading to the following categories: Analysis of the global air transportation system during COVID-19, the impacts on the passenger-centric flight experience, and the long-term impacts on broad aviation. Based on the aggregated reported findings in the literature, this paper concludes with a set of recommendations for future scientific directions; hopefully helping aviation to prepare for a post-COVID-19 world.     

Intermodal integration in air transportation: status quo, motives and future developments

Soaring air traffic, increasing urban expansion and airports operating at full capacity are reasons that have caused a discussion about improvements in airport landside access systems. One approach to better match customer demands and address airport congestion is to facilitate the intermodal integration of airports. Building on a survey on intermodal passenger air transportation, we elaborate on the current and future situation at major airports. Our findings indicate a high modal concentration and dependence on individual access modes. However, while airport managers intend to reduce the share of these modes, they plan to increase that of high-occupancy airport access modes. We analyze the underlying motives that cause airports to extend their connections to surface infrastructure. In a case study, we assess an intermodal best practice solution for the integration of air and rail.     

Air freight hubs in the FedEx system: Analysis of fuel use

This paper provides a data based analysis of FedEx air freighter activities from selected hub locations. The basic idea is that air freighters have a set of range and payload parameters and their corresponding fuel burn depends on weight and distance. Data from 2011 to 12 (FlightAware) are used for 180,000 + flights on origin, destination and aircraft type. The particular aircraft vary widely in payload, but additional parameters may be derived from industry web sites and BTS. The research uses flight activity at hubs such as Memphis and Indianapolis (among others) and computes the aggregate distance flown on specific aircraft. The linkage between the hub and aggregate fuel use (assuming that the out bound flights are allocated to the hub) will give some quantifiable measures of the costs allocated to the hub. The paper examines particular aspects of the air freight system that are especially vulnerable to a spike in the costs of aviation fuel. These observations suggest that traffic to regional air express and air freight hubs is likely to respond in complex ways to fuel costs.     

Air cargo expansion and economic growth: Finding the empirical link

This paper applies Granger causality tests to examine the causal relationship between air cargo expansion and economic growth in Taiwan for the period 1974–2006. The results of cointegration tests show a long-run equilibrium and bi-directional relationship between air cargo expansion and economic growth in the case of Taiwan.     

Air transport globalization, liberalization and sustainability: post-2001 policy dynamics in the United States and Europe

Against a context of international crisis in the air transport industry, this paper examines the implications of the ways in which strategies developed by key air transport stakeholders, as well as the contemporary dynamics of the globalized, liberalized market place, impact directly on sustainability issues. More specifically, the paper has two objectives. First, it discusses the policy ramifications of the interrelationships between the concepts of globalization, liberalization, and sustainability within the air transport industry. Second, the paper explores the import of these interrelationships as they interconnect with stakeholder strategies in the differing geopolitical contexts of the US and EU. Particular attention is given to airline network and frequency strategies. The paper concludes that while the financial sustainability of the airline industry is the overwhelming concern today, if this is essentially the short-term crisis that the airline industry claims it to be, the longer-term predictions of air transport growth will again bring environmental sustainability issues to the fore.     

做大做强客货运输核心业务增强铁路运输企业市场竞争力

做大做强铁路客货运输核心业务,是新形势下转变铁路发展方式的客观需要,也是促进铁路运输企业可持续发展的必然要求。结合郑州铁路局实际。探讨如何通过提升运输效益、提升运输效率和提升服务质量,做大做强客货运输核心业务,增强铁路运输企业市场竞争力。     

Air transport liberalisation and the development of third level airports in France

The liberalisation of air transport in the European Union encouraged a proliferation of new entry airlines exploiting the opportunities offered by minor airports. This was particularly apparent in France where “third level” airports experienced growth associated with start-up airlines using low-capacity aircraft. A summary of these trends is followed by a detailed examination of the Centre-East District, which demonstrates that the aspirations of both airlines and airports have been compromised by recent restructuring of the French airline industry. Far from providing greater competition, deregulation has increased the quasi-monopoly of Air France as market forces proved to be stronger than liberalisation. As a result, many third level airports face an uncertain future, especially in the light of the terrorist attack on the United States and its likely effect on airline economics.     

The influence of greening the suppliers and green innovation on environmental performance and competitive advantage in Taiwan

Recently, many companies have recognized the concepts of green supply chain management or supply chain environmental management. However, relatively little research attention has been devoted to the consideration of relations between greening the supply chain, green innovation, environmental performance and competitive advantage. Hence, this paper aims to bridge this gap by providing empirical evidence to encourage companies to implement green supply chain and green innovation in order to improve their environmental performance, and to enhance their competitive advantage in the global market. A model is constructed to link the aforementioned constructs. Data were collected through a questionnaire-based survey across 124 companies from eight industry sectors in Taiwan. The data are analyzed using Structural Equation Modeling and the results from the final measurement model are used to evaluate the structural model that verifies the significance of the proposed relationships. A prominent result of this study is that greening the supplier through green innovation contributes significant benefits to the environmental performance and competitive advantage of the firm.     

Comparing transportation project development efficiencies: the California department of transportation and the California county sales tax agencies

Finding time and cost efficiencies associated with preliminary and final design of transportation projects has become increasingly difficult. Major new complexities present interesting and challenging project management issues and many agencies have incrementally adapted the project development process to improve efficiencies. Yet our understanding of the project development process is limited and the incremental changes in the process have not resulted in major modifications in the way in which transportation project development is approached for most agencies. A time honored method for elucidating problems with project development and potential solutions to them has been through the use of governmental audits. For example, over the past 30 years some 14 performance audits and evaluations have conducted of the California transportation project development process. These California audits have suggested that voter or legislatively approved projects, in terms of time, cost, or scope, significantly enhance project efficiencies. In this study, we examine time and cost project development efficiencies between voter or legislatively approved projects and projects with standard scopes. We find no significant evidence that state highway projects with highly defined, voter or legislatively approved project scopes, time, or costs are any more likely to have lower project development costs or times than projects with non-voter approved scopes.     

SeMS and sensibility: Security management systems and the management of risk in the Canadian Air Transport Security Authority

Following International Air Transportation Association requirement for all member airlines and airports to have a security management system (SeMS) beginning 1 March 2007, many organizations are looking to learn from safety and quality management systems. Without specific guidelines or best practices, organizations are forced to imitate these processes designed for different goals. Since safety, quality, and security environments operate on radically different principles, SeMS implementation must take a different tack. The case of the Canadian Air Transport Security Authority illustrates the importance of a custom-designed program that meets public and corporate needs. The Authority is responsible for security screening of passengers, non-passengers, and baggage within selected airports. As a crown corporation with a precise statutory mandate and regulatory environment, the development of a SeMS illustrates some of the key problems for the application of SeMS to larger organizations.     

Designing aviation networks under Public Service Obligations (PSO): A case study in Greece

The present paper explores a Greek case study on optimizing the design of aviation networks under Public Service Obligations (PSO). Based on previous research on airline PSO networks applied to the case studies of the Azores and Norway, optimization models are adapted to minimize not only the cost to the airline, but also the total social costs. Different predictive models to estimate demand are developed and included in the optimization models. It is found that after applying the developed demand and optimization models, the total network costs can be reduced significantly, compared to the actual network's operation ranging from 4% to 20%.     

Linking transportation and population health to reduce racial and ethnic disparities in transportation injury: Implications for practice and policy

In both developing and advanced economies, it is commonly believed that lower income and minority populations are disproportionately at risk of being injured or killed in a motor vehicle crash, especially as pedestrians. However, this risk is rarely quantified with information about exposure. We argue that a combined transportation–population health framework is one way to quantify, and therefore prioritize, equity considerations in transportation safety decision-making. We illustrate this approach with an analysis that compares age-adjusted fatal and nonfatal injury rates per 100 million person-trips by race/ethnicity and sex for motor vehicle occupants, bicyclists, and pedestrians. We found that, per trip, whites are equally safe as pedestrians and motor vehicle occupants, whereas other racial and ethnic groups for whom we have data are less safe when they walk. In addition, black/African-American female motor vehicle occupants and pedestrians have higher inpatient injury risk than female travelers of other races and ethnicities (for whom we had sufficient data). Such differences in transportation injury risk by race and ethnicity warrant deeper analysis to understand the underlying reasons, such as whether certain groups of travelers are exposed to qualitatively different hazards when they travel. We discuss frameworks for including information about injury disparities in decision-making.     

Regulation in the air: price-and-frequency caps

In spite of deregulation on the air-transportation markets, many connections are still operated by a single operator on regional markets, in particular in Europe. Evidence thus calls for some regulation in this industry. There is, however, a great concern for the (possibly negative) consequences of price regulation on the quality of services. We argue that both aspects should be considered jointly and propose a mechanism for the decentralization of the optimal structure of services. The regulatory procedure is based on the sole book-keeping data and requires the regulator to use only an estimate of travellers’ average value of time.     

Domestic air passenger traffic and economic growth in China: Evidence from heterogeneous panel models

This paper applies recent panel methodology to examine the short-run dynamics, the long-run equilibrium relationships and the Granger causal relationship between economic growth and domestic air passenger traffic. It is based on the quarterly panel data of 29 provinces in China from the period of 2006Q1 to 2012Q3. Tests for panel unit roots, cointegration in heterogeneous panels and panel causality are employed in a bi-variate panel vector error correction model (PVECM), which is estimated by the system generalized moment method (SYS-GMM). The results show evidence of a long-run equilibrium relationship between economic growth and domestic air passenger traffic. Specifically, 1% increase in the air passenger traffic is found to lead to an increase of 0.943% in real gross domestic product (GDP). A long-run and strong bi-directional Granger causal relationship is found between these two series. It is also found that there is a short-run uni-directional Granger causality running from the domestic air passenger traffic to the economic growth.     

Regional transportation planning in the US: An examination of changes in technical aspects of the planning process in response to changing goals

This paper presents a framework for examining the ways in which technical aspects of the regional transportation planning process are changing in response to a broadening of goals and strategies, driven in part by an increased emphasis on public involvement. As an illustration of this framework, the long-range plans of four Metropolitan Planning Organizations (MPOs) in the US are analyzed with respect to goals, performance measures, and use of forecasts. These examples suggest that changes in the technical aspects of the process are lagging changes in planning goals. As a result, plans may implicitly emphasize congestion relief even if they put forth a much broader range of goals. This paper provides a basis for further analysis of the current evolution of transportation planning in the US.     

Istanbul Airport (IGA) and quest of best competitive strategy for air cargo carriers in new competition environment: A fuzzy multi-criteria approach

Our paper determines the best competitive strategy that can be implemented by existing and potential air cargo carriers in the Turkish Air Cargo Industry with the operationalization of Istanbul Airport (IGA) and reveals the competitiveness level of the industry for four bases. We look at the competitiveness levels by analyzing the competitive environment of the industry nationally and internationally both before and post IGA (estimated). We use fuzzy TOPSIS (FTOPSIS) based on the Fuzzy AHP (FAHP) to handle vagueness, which is inherent in the nature of new competition conditions integrating the framework of Porter's five forces analysis. In our study, we use the five forces as our main criteria (with a total of 19 sub-criteria) and the competitive strategies as our alternatives. Our results reveal that the cost-focused strategy is the best competitive strategy that can be implemented by existing and potential carriers in the industry. Another significant result underscores the fact that IGA increases the competitiveness level of the Turkish Air Cargo Industry both nationally and internationally to a fairly high level. Also, the threat of potential competitors is first among the five forces in the industry's new conditions. Our study fills the gap in the literature on the effects of major structural changes in an air cargo industry on the competition among carriers.     

Inter-island passenger shipping in Indonesia: development of the system: Present characteristics and future requirements

The developing of inter-island passenger shipping is examined in the vast but unevenly populated Indonesian archipelago with particular attention to improvements in the transport system since 1981. The adequacy of the current network is analysed in terms of frequency of service, overall journey time and average speed. An assessment is made of the future improvements required in the inter-island passenger shipping service.     

Defining and monitoring the quality of shared-use transportation facilities in parks and recreation areas

Transportation networks in parks and recreation areas provide travelers recreation opportunities and often support multiple transportation modes (e.g., hiking, walking, biking). In recreation areas, the quality of transportation service may be monitored and evaluated differently than in traditional transportation contexts. However, few studies have examined approaches for defining and monitoring the quality of transportation service and recreation experiences. This study applies traffic monitoring models to monitor (1) the quality of transportation service through the Levels of Service (LOS) framework and (2) travelers’ recreation experiences through the indicators and standards framework simultaneously on the Burlington Bike Path (BBP), a typical shared-use transportation recreation facility in Vermont. Results identify the temporal pattern of visitors use and the mode splits between cyclists and pedestrians. Moreover, study results show that the majority of travelers use the BBP for recreation or mixed purpose of recreation and commute. Study results build quantitative relationships between LOS and indicators and standards of quality that will help inform management of transportation in the context of recreation. The indicators and standards framework can help define the thresholds of acceptable levels of transportation service through the LOS framework. The relationships between LOS and the indicators and standards framework help build a robust and fully parameterized transportation planning and management framework for parks and recreation areas. Study results suggest quantitative guidelines that can be used to evaluate and monitor the quality of transportation performance for shared-use paths in parks and recreation areas.     

Evolution trends of the network structure of Spring Airlines in China: A temporal and spatial analysis

Both the sustainable development of China's economy and the deregulation of the China air transport market have acted as a spur for the halting development of low-cost carriers (LCCs) in China. To analyze the development trends of LCCs' network in China, this paper took Spring Airlines, the only LCC in China as an example. First, the winter flight plans of Spring Airlines from 2005 to 2013 were collected. Secondly, the development trends of air transport network of Spring Airlines were explored with methods of mathematical statistics and social network analysis. Additionally, the development trends were analyzed from the levels of navigable cities, air routes and air transport networks. The results show that although Spring Airlines actively launched air routes between tourist cities with non-class I airports, its network has been transformed from a star structure into a complex one with multi-hubs. The development process of the Spring Airlines network can be separated into three stages. In addition, the problems and evolution trends of its network are discussed further.