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FINDINGS & RECOMMENDATIONS: 

SUBCOMMITTEE ON AIRPORTS SPRING 2018 MEETING

Atlantic City, NJ | March 20, 2018

The Subcommittee on Airports of the FAA’s Research, Engineering, and Development Advisory 

Committee (REDAC) met on March 20, 2018, at the FAA’s William J. Hughes Technical Center 

in Atlantic City, New Jersey. The Subcommittee had the opportunity to discuss the current 

status of the FAA’s Airport Technology Research Program and the Program’s future plans 

through 2022.

The Subcommittee felt that good progress had been made across the Program’s portfolio of 19

research project areas (RPAs) as shown below.

Safety & Planning RPAs Pavement RPAs

S1 Airport Planning & Design

S2 Airport Safety Data Mining

S3 Aircraft Rescue & Firefighting

S4 Wildlife Hazard Mitigation

S5 Visual Guidance

S6 Runway Surface Safety Technology

S7 Airport Safety & Surveillance Sensors

S9 Airport Research Taxiway

S10 UAS Integration at Airports

P1 National Airport Pavement Testing Facility

P2 National Airport Pavement Materials Research Center

P3 Field Instrumentation & Testing

P4 Advanced Materials

P5 Pavement Design & Evaluation

P6 Non-destructive Testing Technologies

P7 Software Program Development and Support

P8 Extended Pavement Life

Airport Noise & Environmental RPAs* New/Enhanced Facilities

N1 National Noise Survey

N2 DNL & Metrics Evaluation

N3 Sleep Disturbance

N4 Noise Mitigation

N5 Operations

E1 Environmental Tools and Guidance

Fire Safety Building

Pavement Lab Extension

Photo Laboratory

* Airport noise and environmental RPAs are being co-managed by the FAA Offices of Airports and Energy & 

Environment.

The Subcommittee remains supportive of the program’s ongoing work and future research 

directions, which continue to emphasize foundational research to support (1) advisory circulars 

and design guidance promulgated by the FAA Office of Airports, (2) airport infrastructure 

enhancements currently eligible or prospectively eligible for federal grant funding under the 

Airport Improvement Program, and (3) U.S leadership in areas of airport safety, planning, and 

infrastructure.

The Subcommittee agreed that all of its prior open recommendations from the Spring and Fall of 

2017 can be closed presuming that the draft responses to them are approved by the FAA Acting 

Administrator.

The Subcommittee was alarmed by the drastic reduction in FAA research and development 

funding that appeared in the White House’s FY2019 budget. Although the Airport Technology 

Research Program would not be directly affected by these reductions—given that its funding is 

provided under the Airport Improvement Program, the drastic R&D funding cuts would have 

negative indirect impacts on the Airport program and significantly harm all of the FAA’s other 

R&D programs. We are pleased that the Administration and the U.S. Congress decided followed 

a different course with passage of the Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2018 (Pub. L. No. 
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115-141), which did not include these cuts. We are hopeful for longer-term R&D funding stability 

via multi-year FAA reauthorization legislation.

Findings and Recommendations

The following findings and recommendations were developed during the Subcommittee’s 

deliberations. The Subcommittee does not believe that any of these require consideration by the 

FAA Acting Administrator. 

FINDING 1: The Subcommittee is pleased that Program staff have begun researching safety 

and design standards for commercial spaceports. We believe that this research should be 

coordinated with the recently-established and rapidly-moving commercial airspace aviation 

rulemaking committees (ARCs), principally the Spaceport Categorization ARC.

RECOMMENDATION 1: The Subcommittee recommends that the Airport Technology Research 

Program staff coordinate with the FAA’s Designated Federal Official assigned to the Spaceport 

Categorization ARC to ensure the ARC is briefed on and possibly provide input into the

spaceport standards research project.

FINDING 2: As was the case at our Fall 2017 meeting, the Subcommittee placed a high priority 

on research into new categories of aeronautical vehicles--UAS and commercial space vehicles 

specifically--and their potential impacts on airport safety, operations, and infrastructure. Other 

high priority research areas are (1) pilot perception of light emitting diode (LED)-based airfield 

lighting systems (RPA S5), (2) aircraft rescue and firefighting (ARFF) agents (RPA S3), (3) 

runway incursion prevention technologies (RPA S1), and (4) noise standard 

development/refinement based on the findings of ongoing noise annoyance data collection 

(RPAs N2-N5). In order to facilitate ARFF research and store valuable ARFF test equipment 

and vehicles, the Subcommittee also finds construction of the fire safety building to be a high 

priority.

RECOMMENDATION 2: The Subcommittee continues to recommend that the FAA Office of 

Airports place a high priority on research and facilities noted in Finding 2.

FINDING 3: The Subcommittee remains pleased by the FAA’s involvement of a Working Group 

of subject matter experts (SMEs) to reassess aircraft braking research. Given that the Working 

Group’s efforts span multiple subcommittees’ areas of expertise, it will be important to 

coordinate its work across relevant subcommittees.

RECOMMENDATION 3: The Subcommittee recommends that the findings and proposed 

approach to future braking research developed by the Aircraft Braking Working Group be 

coordinated with relevant Subcommittees, namely Human Factors, Aircraft Safety, and NAS 

Operations. This coordination can take the form briefings to each of these Subcommittees at 

their Summer/Fall 2018 meetings if time permits.

FINDING 4: The Subcommittee understands that safety, technical, and operational issues may 

preclude effective testing of trapezoidal runway grooving in a worn configuration (e.g., grooving 

“worn” to a half-depth condition) at Atlantic City International Airport. These issues, which 

include challenges in getting the Tech Center’s B727 aircraft braking test bed to a high enough 

speed to appropriately simulate landing aircraft braking performance, concerns on the part of 

the airport operator that half-depth grooving could compromise actual aircraft landing 

performance, and limited test durations driven by these concerns.
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RECOMMENDATION 4: The Subcommittee recommends that the FAA reconsider ways in 

which the performance of worn trapezoidal grooves—both in terms of drainage and effects on 

aircraft braking—can be evaluated, including through cooperation with other countries’ Civil 

Aviation Authorities where trapezoidal grooves have been installed on active runways (e.g., 

Singapore).

FINDING 5: The National Airport Pavement Testing Facility (NAPTF) in Atlantic City, a proven 

national aviation asset, requires maintenance investments—specifically a roof replacement--to 

ensure its continuing functionality. 

RECOMMENDATION 5: The Subcommittee recommends moving forward with plans to replace 

the roof of the NAPTF as soon as practicable.

Future Meetings

The Subcommittee will meet next at the FAA Technical Center on August 21-22, 2018.