Designing the Airport of Tomorrow - Annotated Bibliography Example

International Civil Aviation Organization Report Article 1 Ericsson, S., Odeberg, J., Parliden, B. & Rollen, J. (2008) Designing the Airport of Tomorrow: A Sustainable Concept to Meet Future Needs and Requirements. ICAO Journal, 2008; 63(3): 12-15. This article basically examines ways of designing airports in a sustainable manner so that they meet future needs and requirements. The article opens by observing that today’s airports present a number of challenges because they constitute complex operations where social, economic and environmental systems have to interact functionally and efficiently. Therefore, in order to deliver positive business results, airport authorities and planners have to design and manage these interacting processes and systems. This means aligning and managing in parallel the seemingly disparate objectives and requirements so that they support each other and create value for stakeholders. Sustainable development requires the adoption of a holistic approach that takes into account social equity, economic growth and environmental management. The article outlines sustainable methodologies that can be adopted to design airports for the emerging challenges in the 21st century. In the article, the authors identify three cornerstones for the development of sustainable airports. These include: the environment; capacity and efficiency and; safety and security. These three cornerstones are centered on business development and value creation. According to Ericsson et al (2008), airports’ operations present a dilemma, especially when it comes to balancing certain factors such as safety and security and capacity and efficiency. Drawing from Swedavia’s experience, the authors emphasize that a positive total experience can only be achieved if operations run efficiently and with enough capacity, are safe and secure, and have an environmental sound strategy. The article identifies safety and security as the two most significant factors in commercial air transport. In ensuring safety and security, the challenge lies in the identification and clarification of the main security and safety concerns on a local and global basis. The solution lies in Security Management Systems and Safety Management Systems, as well as design and implementation of comprehensive safety systems that fulfill ICAO’s requirements of certification process for aerodromes. Capacity and efficiency have to do with the social and economic aspects of air transport. In coping with issues of inefficiency and lack of capacity, airports have to adopt certain tools. One such tool provided by the authors is collaborative decision-making which can be used to increase predictability. Predictability is of great significance to airports and airlines in their operations management and enhances decision-making capabilities through the sharing of information by airport partners. Another potential tool presented in the article is the locking of latent capacity which involves adopting the best practices for taxiway, runway and apron operations. Environment comes in as a value-adding factor. Environmental challenges require constant consideration during design, construction, operation and maintenance of the airport and its systems. This can be achieved by use of structured systems such as an environmental management system. Therefore, the article identifies a number of issues on the design of sustainable airports. The three main pillars of the sustainable development concept for airports are economic growth, social equity and environmental management. The three cornerstones of business development and value creation are safety and security, capacity and efficiency and the environment. the three phase process developed to achieve greater sustainability involves expanding knowledge base, creating partnership and strengthening stakeholder relationships and strengthening internal capabilities. The article explicitly states that the design, planning, implementation and management of operations should “fulfill the requirements of an ICAO certification process for aerodromes” (Ericsson et al., 2008). Article 2 Graham, N. (2011) Focusing on Risk: A Global Approach to Runway Safety. ICAO Journal, 2011; 66(2): 3-4. In this article, the author examines the need to focus on risk in developing ways of ensuring runway safety. According to Graham (2011), safety tops ICAO’s priorities. The article opens by examining some figures. Demand for air transport has continued to increase, and world traffic was expected to increase by 4.7% in 2011 and 4.9% in 2012. Also, the article notes that aviation is the safest means of transportation with a global accident rate of about 4.1 accidents in every million departures. ICAO has adopted a more action-oriented approach in the promotion of safe development of international civil aviation through the advancement of safety management practices such as Safety Management Systems and the State Safety Programme. ICAO’s plan is about effectively focusing resources on reducing risk. Graham (2011) observes that runway safety is currently the highest risk area. The article then introduces the issue of runway incursion, citing studies that point to correlations between growth in traffic and increases in runway incursion. This has led to the establishment of a global agreement on a new description for runway incursions, a step led to a series of international seminars culminating in the publication of the Manual on the Prevention of Runway Incursions, aimed at significantly improving runway safety. The author observes that though much success has been achieved with regard to runway incursions, runway excursions remain a notable area of concern and risk. Excursions are described as serious risks to runway safety, and they are currently 30 times more likely to occur than incursions. Graham (2011) cites this as an “unacceptable situation”. Runway safety, with respect to excursions, incursions and runway confusion, are multidisciplinary issues that require high levels of cooperation and coordination between all stakeholders in the air transport industry. They include aircraft and airport operators, avionics and aircrafts manufacturers, air navigation regulators and service providers and associations that represent air traffic controllers and pilots. All these people or groups are critical in the development of effective runway safety solutions. The article points out that ICAO continues to review and amend its requirements and guidance material so as to better reflect new information and best practices that are under implementation by safety stakeholders all over the world. For example, improvements have been made to Annexes 6, 11 and 14 and amendments and new provisions added to ICAO’s Standards and Recommended Practices (SARPs) to reduce runway excursions. The article acknowledges the importance of establishing higher levels of coordination in order to ensure the sharing of information and best practices that relate to runway excursions. Such levels of coordination can be beneficial to aviation stakeholders on a globally-harmonized basis and more quickly. The author also provides insights on the Global Runway Safety Symposium (GRSS) held in 2011. The symposium’s goal was to identify the common elements in the framework for runway safety. This includes fine tuning more locally-focused solutions and tools through a series of regional runway safety workshops. Increasing awareness and outreach among all stakeholders, the reductions in runway excursions’ rates will be comparable to those achieved for runway incursions. This article has thus explored a critical element of airports which is the runway. Runway safety is significant to ensuring airport safety. As such, this article manages to cite Annexes 6, 11 and 14 which are part of ICAO’s Standards for airport related operations. References Ericsson, S., Odeberg, J., Parliden, B. & Rollen, J. (2008) Designing the Airport of Tomorrow: A Sustainable Concept to Meet Future Needs and Requirements. ICAO Journal, 2008; 63(3): 12-15. Graham, N. (2011) Focusing on Risk: A Global Approach to Runway Safety. ICAO Journal, 2011; 66(2): 3-4. Read More