Current Issues Affecting an Airport - Literature review Example

Current Issues Affecting an Airport Current Issues Affecting an Airport When considering the current issues affecting the airline industry, specifically the airports, it would be helpful to align the emerging trends in their proper context. The discussion should begin with a review of the basic trends that the aviation and airport industry are facing in their routine activities. The major trends include alterations in the airline, with the inclusion of airline hubbing and route structures, the consistent growth in the air cargo and airline passenger markets, and growth in the worldwide economy and the changing global political environment. With careful consideration of the emerging trends, it is observable that airports are supposed to have the ability of maintaining a flexible response to the changes in the industry that is affected greatly by political, technological, and economic events, hence reshaping all extremes of airport operations (Derudder, 2012). After considering the above trends, it is clear that The Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport needs to come up with a program aimed at improving and renovating its airport to make its operations better and maximize its profits. Currently, the airline company has the program that is aimed at improving and modernizing its terminals through the availability of more choices for foods and shopping, bathrooms, and seating. It also aims at adding destinations by addition of gates that are able to handle both domestic and international flights and also minimizing the delays of flights by the addition of a second runway that will increase the number of landings and take-offs. Among its projects include Concourse A in Terminal 1, modernization of terminals 1, 2, and 3, expansion of terminal 4, New South Runway, Pedestrian Bridges, and canopies (Hume, 2010). The main objective of FLLAIR is to avail better experience of the customers through modern facilities. The improvements and modernizations are estimated to cost the Broward County Aviation Department $2.3 billion for the four successive years to attain the changes and improvements aimed at. According to the plan, the aviation department does not plan to use any Broward County tax funds to fund the projects. The funding is expected to be obtained from grants from the State and the Federal governments, and from the charges from passenger facility. The current aviation companies are faced with various issues. One of the issues is affected flights. The statistics from the flight companies try to match up their airport delays with the flights that were affected by the delays or may have been affected. Airports are faced with general departure and arrival delays for numerous reasons. Among the reasons, congestion and weather have been outstanding and the most common. The delays are normally temporary in nature. Once the arrival delays become worse, the air traffic control may give a ground delay or ground stop program. If the delays are present, the section for delays shows information regarding these general departure and arrival delays. The information shows the minimum and maximum times that the flights are being delayed and a general trend that indicates whether the times are decreasing or increasing. Another issue is the ground stops. These are implemented by the air traffic control during the time when the size of the traffic is projected, or it has exceeded the abilities of the airport for a short duration. The delays are given for duration, and they affect the flights that are heading to the airports, but they have not departed yet. The flights are withheld at the departing airport till the ground stop comes to an end. The ground stops may affect various parts of the country, and they may also not affect. For instance, if a ground stop is issued in the SFO may have effects on the other airports located on the west coast though they are less probable to affect the airports located on the east coast (Low, Tang, & Yuan, 2010). The reason is that the flights that depart from longer distances land at later times in the day when the airport is estimated to be capable of handling more arrivals. If the estimated duration of capacity problems is anticipated to be longer, the air traffic control may give a ground program that is more sophisticated for the airport. If the ground stops are present, the section for Ground Stop Program gives the information regarding ground stops. The end ad begin times are shown together with the maximum and average times that the flights that depart for the airport may face delays. Capacity and Delay The airports all around the globe have been faced with the challenge of higher levels of delay. This makes it no surprise to consider the issue of delay and capacity as one of the topmost issues affecting airports. As many analysts of the industry making predictions of more than double passenger traffic in the future 10 to 15 years, the prevailing problem of capacity and delay will only become worse. To curb the issues of capacity and delay, more private and public investment will be of much help. The concerns that were raised concerning this problem included the question of when the change to National Airspace Systems will be achieved and the party responsible for payment of the bills and how the effects of flight delays observed in one airport affect passengers and airlines nationwide. Another concern that was raised included how the National Airspace Systems (NAS) that use advanced technology as promised for the future will affect aircraft and airports. Considering that the Air Commerce Act of 1962 that ordered the Secretary of Commerce to come up with lighted airways that will help the pilots to see their flight route during the night, and the present state of the airports that is almost making nationwide system of airways that uses navigation obsolete, the issues must be raised (Wells, 2000). Denver International Airport can be given as a perfect example of how the construction of a new airport aimed at reducing delay in a single city could help in reducing delays in the whole system. As the complexity of NAS still increases, the interaction of congestion and delays at a single airport can have a great impact on the entire system. There are serious aspects regarding Federal Aviation Administration outdated equipment and its staff. The federal agency that is bestowed with the responsibility of regulating and controlling airport access and aircraft movements has undergone changes a lot of times in the past 75 years. Discussions regarding the important impending changes that may take place several times in the future centuries have been there. The question that has been recurring concerns how the changes will affect the regulation and configuration of the airports in future. Again, it is concerned with the implications of the new technology and the changing fleet mix, for instance, the Global Positioning System. Several other questions regard what the future aircraft mix will be at the commercial service airports, whether the super-jumbo aircraft will be landing in huge numbers, whether there will be growth in the small aircraft enabled by large-scale production and advances in the aircraft technology, and whether a technology breakthrough will help in the elimination of the wake vortex problems that make the spacing of departing and landing aircraft far apart (Truxal, 2012). Improvements in the approaches that require instruments guided by precision are on the immediate horizon, and they have precision runway motoring and differential Global Positioning System. These new improvements will avail quick reduction of the delay situation. New Aircraft The only most crucial issue regarding airport and aircraft compatibility is related to the introduction of the new super-jumbo aircraft. When the passenger jet aircraft were introduced into the United States commercial service in the year 1958, there was a serious need for long runways at the key United States airports. In the year 1970, when the Boeing 747 that were wide-bodied were introduced, there was created yet another need for major revision to the airport infrastructure so that they could accommodate aircrafts that were used to carry more than four hundred passengers and were made having a wingspan that was approximately 60 meters. However, it is difficult to look at the crystal ball. The question that may arise here is concerned with whether the proposal of New Large Aircraft aired by Boeing and Airbus, which may carry over 600 passengers and have a wingspan that exceeds 80 meters, be made in large quantities. Unluckily, this may not be a decision that can be made today (Manley, 2008). Though the technology will still exist, the cost of development is very high. The only factor that will determine whether the New Large Aircraft will be made in huge numbers is the market forces in the next ten years. The constraints in the system imposed by the competition that arises from other airlines and the global economy, landing and takeoff congestion, and the operating costs of the airline will determine whether the proposed NLA will be able to make business sense or not. In most of the response from the aviation industry, this issue started as a concern for the effects of introducing the New Large Aircraft, but it rapidly grew into the discussion of diversity in the fleet mix and the impacts of the recent generation of aircrafts of all sizes in the airports. The aircrafts ranging from regional jets to the narrow-body twins to the proposed NLA are covered in the new aircraft spectrum. Every new type of aircrafts presents a different challenge to the airlines, and the airport operators and planners (Abu-Taieh, 2009). The first key point that was highlighted in this section is the need for the International Civil Aeronautics Organization and the FAA standards for the existing versus new airfields. The reason is that it is easier to apply new standards for the large aircraft to new airports, than to the existing airports. In the United States, it is cost prohibitive to increase the distances between runways on many of the landlocked main airports. The second key point is the importance of beginning to plan for the large aircrafts now, but not when they are almost entering into service. Luckily, it takes some years to make, test, and certify any new aircraft. Unluckily, it consumes more time in most worldwide locales to decide on, develop a plan, design, and construct a new runway. The third key point is the issues regarding in-trail separation and wake turbulence. The more the gross weight of the aircraft, the more the wake turbulence that is produced by the aircraft at the same speed (Manley, 2008). If there was to be built a super-heavy aircraft, the determination of the safe distance that should be maintained by a following lighter aircraft has not yet arrived. Any probable increment of the in-trail separation may eliminate any probable capacity gains of a large aircraft in a particular aircraft fleet mixes. The fourth key point is the issues regarding the interaction of aircraft and the runway. The heavier and larger aircraft will respond to the unevenness of the long-wavelength pavement, which has never been a safety concern in the past. The increased responses of the aircraft will dynamically the pavement and the structure of the aircraft, antiskid braking system, and the landing gear. The results may be threatening to the infrastructure of the nation as well as affecting the safety required in the aircraft operations. There is the need for defining the existing environment of the runway and a need for the ICAO and the FAO to set a criterion that will limit the unevenness of the pavement. The fifth factor that arises in this area is the opportunities for advanced flight deck management systems and taxiway guidance aimed at reducing requirements for aircraft separation (Derudder, 2012). The improvement in cockpit technology may allow commercial service aircraft without pilots. However, not everyone will have the belief that the public that would be traveling would accept that kind of service in the future. However, the technology will allow reductions in the safe aircraft separation from each other on the ground and in the air. The question that will arise here is whether the results of putting this new technology into practice will be a huge burden on the airports, or they will facilitate more saving. Environmental Concerns In the discussion, it is also good to consider the environmental issues since they affect the airports greatly. The great emphasis laid on the environment in all the spheres of the society is also evident in the aviation arena. The major focus for many years in the environmental area for the airports has been noise. Presently, nearly every airport manager is faced with a full range of environmental issues. In fact, in many of the occasions, the environmental concern and the possible remedy may be the factor that determines whether the facilities can be built affordably. Owing to the fact that the 1969 National Environment Policy Act (NEPA) have only been in practice for thirty years, the question is what may be expected in the next thirty or fifty years (Hume, 2010). Preservation of the environment and environmental regulation could have the greatest impacts on aircrafts and airports in the future, and could be a threat to the national aviation system as it is thought about today. Nevertheless, new technology, on the same token, may develop other measures that reduce the reliance on fossil fuels. The major points that should be covered by the aviation professionals should include several factors. The first factor is the technical approaches and soil remediation. This factor concerns the method that an airport can use to recover the cost of cleaning up the soil, and how cleanliness is defined. The second factor is the need for more time to deal with environmental issues and processes. The worth of NEPA regulations in thirty years that have been an extra piecemeal, with varying interpretations for various standard industrial codes, has led to longer processes of dealing with the regulations in place. The question in this factor will be whether the process of environmental compliance will become longer to an extent that new construction is suppressed to an extent where the system is unable ever to catch up in increasing the capacity to airports (Wells, 2000). The airports have been always able to manage being flexible in the construction of facilities in the short times in the efforts aimed at satisfying airline demand. The lengthy process of environmental compliance will reduce the flexibility of the airports. The third factor is the air quality issues. The industry of air transportation is not a large contributor to emissions that pollute the air relative to the other emissions from other means of transport and industrial emissions found in large metropolitan areas. Nevertheless, the airport is probable for the mitigation mandated by the government. In the large metropolitan areas, ground vehicles that have alternative fuels will be standard fixtures in many of the airports. However, more research is helpful in this area in both remediation techniques and analysis techniques (Truxal, 2012). The fourth factor is energy conservation. The future airports will work aiming at achieving sustainable resources. The airports need to develop better practices of waste management that recycles the renewable resources, and also come up with better energy-saving lights. The airports will be required to develop strategic plans for energy frequently and in the same way as they usually do in their current master planning process. Conclusion As Captain Randy Forester observed, the airport needs longer runways for the larger airplanes. He is the pilot who, during the inauguration flight, flew the JetBlue on the new runway. He added that longer runways would be helpful since they will be able to take off from the runway, depart on the same runway and also land on it. According to him, it implies that there are two runways that are really good and that can be put into use. The idea of the partially elevated 8,000-foot runway was adopted almost thirty years ago, with the groundbreaking of the runway taking place in January of the year 2012. All through the duration of the project, the airline company created 11,000 temporary jobs. With the FLL having two runways that are meant for commercial aviation, the company hopes to minimize delays of the flights and accommodate the volume of the present and expected flight traffic better (Derudder, 2012). In the year 2013, the airport received 23.5 million visitors, and it is able to accommodate between 600,000 and 700,000 flights annually. In addition, FLL ranks number 21 in the United States in the total passenger traffic. Barbara Sharief, who is the Broward County Mayor, added that they are planning to have increased international flights, more generation of revenue in the airport, and create more job positions, which will make it a win-win situation for Broward County. References: Hume, K. (2010). Sleep disturbance due to noise: current issues and future research. Noise & Health, 12, 47.) Low, J. M. W., Tang, L. C., & Yuan, X.-M. C. (April 01, 2010). Analysis of the Cargo Service Dynamics in East Asian Airports. International Journal of Applied Logistics, 1, 2, 1-22. Truxal, S. (2012). Competition and regulation in the airline industry: Puppets in chaos. Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon: Routledge. Abu-Taieh, E. M. O. (January 01, 2009). Economic Analysis of Airline Tickets and the Role of IT in Affecting the Aviation Industry. Journal of Information Technology Research, 2, 1, 39-52. Manley, B. (2008). Minimizing the pain in air transportation: Analysis of performance and equity in ground delay programs. Wells, A. T. (2000). Airport planning & management. New York: McGraw-Hill. Derudder, B. (2012). International handbook of globalization and world cities. Cheltenham, UK: Edward Elgar. Read More