REDAC / NAS Ops 

Rob Hunt, AJV-73 

March 2017

Operations Concept Development & Infrastructure (ATDP) 

BLI Number:  1A01C

Federal Aviation

Administration

1

Why is this program necessary?  

The FAA is proceeding with NAS modernization based on the NextGen Operational Concept for 2025.  Concept development and validation is necessary to investigate specific concept elements, and to drive out operational and technical requirements and implications for human factors, training and procedures.  This program assesses the interaction of changing roles and responsibilities of NAS service providers and pilots, airspace changes, procedural changes and new mechanized systems for distributing weather, traffic and other flight related information.  It tests the assumptions behind common situational awareness and distributed information processing.The program uses analyses and associated white papers to validate whether future system requirements meet NextGen goals, including the flight data processing evolution in En Route Automation Modernization (ERAM), data communications, the future voice switch, changes in surveillance requirements and associated procedures, establishment of new roles and responsibilities to support increased productivity, etc.  It will develop methods, metrics, and models to demonstrate that the modernized system can handle anticipated growth in traffic demand according to the Terminal Area Forecasts (TAF) for incremental years.  This supports the goal of continued US leadership internationally and helps ensure the global harmonization through continued support for the ICAO Global ATM operational concept, the development of global requirements, and the definition of an air transportation performance framework.

Operations Concept Development & Infrastructure - ATDP  

3

Operations Concept Development & Infrastructure - ATDP  

What are the benefits to the FAA

The activity supports the FAA’s Strategic Initiatives by delivering benefits through technology and infrastructure; Concept validation supports development, analysis, and simulation of new concepts to assess requirements and to evaluate the impact of the concept on system capacity, efficiency, safety and human performance. Evaluation criteria include the following:

Impact/Improvement to Air Traffic Service Providers, airspace users, and automation that could increase capacity,

Impact/Improvement on airspace structure which may increase productivity and hence capacity, 

Impact/Improvement on communication, navigation, and surveillance (CNS) requirements to support the FAA's efforts to reducing cost, increasing capacity and efficiency and;

Impact/Improvement on automation, display, and facility configuration elements to increase productivity and hence capacity.

What determines program success

Success is measured by the completion of the goals identified in multi-year plans developed for each activity.  Initiatives that successfully complete all the project goals identified are then presented as candidates for acquisition.

3

4

Operations Concept Development & Infrastructure – ATDP / BLI Number:  1A01C Overview Capabilities

People:

  Program Manager: Rob Hunt 

  Subject Matter Experts: Traffic Managers, ATC, Discipline Experts, Airspace User Community 

  Research Partners: ANG, NASA, Mitre, Lincoln Labs, Volpe, Academia

Laboratories:

  MITRE

  Tech Center

  DAB Test Bed

  NASA

  Volpe

4

Top ofDescent

TRACON Boundary

CMP

Arrival Metering*

Path Stretch

 MeterPoint

Extended Metering* 

XMP

40 NM

550 NM

160-140 NM

Delay Countdown Timer*

Terminal Metering

 Merge Point

  near FAF

XMP

300-280 NM

Scheduling Freeze Horizon 

Graphic Not to Scale

Freeze Horizon Distances are notional and will vary by location

* Indicates capability is fielded 

Coupled Scheduling*

PBN Procedures:  Optimizes design of airspace and STAR procedures to enable more efficient arrival operations.   

Extended Metering:  Greater range for distribution of delay (expands solution horizon) for arrivals 

TSAS Tools

Research Focus Areas

Ground Interval Management:  

Speed advisories to achieve meet-time at meter fixes.   

Terminal Sequence and Spacing Tools:  Metering in the TRACON and provides Controller Managed Spacing tools.

5

Ground-based

Flight Deck-based

Time of Arrival Control  (RTA)

IM En Route and Terminal Operations

Speed Advisories* (GIM-S)

Path Stretch:    Closed-Loop lateral maneuver to absorb delays

PBN and Time, Speed, Spacing Tools Optimization 

Objectives:  Expand the efficient use of PBN procedures in the NAS (leveraging the PBN NAV Strategy) and apply time, speed, spacing tools to    achieve operational  goals

Potential Activities:   Concept engineering activities (to include ATDs) designed to mature the tools necessary to enable the PBN NAV Strategy and achieve throughput, flight efficiency, safety, and other enterprise-level benefits

Datacomm when/where available

5

Cross-Capability Integration Analysis

Objective:  Continued examination of possible cross-capability integration issues as emerging concepts evolve and new concepts are planned for the mid-term

Potential Activities:  Scenario development/update/execution, mitigation recommendations (e.g. further research, reqs)

*RTCA Support

Continued support of international standards and public/private collaboration

6

6

Research Focus Areas

Extended

Metering

Coupled

Scheduling

Airborne Reroutes

Pre-Departure Reroutes

IDAC

CTOP

TSAS

Adjacent Center

Metering

Data Comm

Speed Control

CRDA

ATPA

Wake

CSPO 

OAPM

RNAV / RNP

Departure Scheduling

6

7

Questions?

7

# image3.png

# image4.jpeg

# image5.wmf

# image6.wmf

# image14.png

# image15.png

# image16.png

# image7.png

# image8.png

# image9.png

# image10.png

# image11.png

# image12.png

# image13.png

# image1.jpeg