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Giving Airports a Sporting Chance
Alex Lake, Aviation Director (Europe), AECOM

Introduction

The world loves sport, and the world loves to watch sport. According to the UK Department for Transport upwards of 380,000 visitors will arrive at the 16-day London 2012 Olympics by air. Similarly, the 2010 FIFA World Cup in South Africa is expected to attract 500,000 air passengers during a single month. Inevitably therefore sporting events such as these bring about major peaks in passenger volumes at hub and regional airports.

Given that such peaks are relatively short lived, it will often not make commercial sense to increase airport capacity by investing in new permanent infrastructure for this reason alone. The most sustainable answer often lies in making best use of existing infrastructure and optimising resources to meet very high, but short-lived demands. Otherwise, the result is likely to be a post-games legacy of over investments with poor returns once the spectators, athletes and media have gone. The investment in infrastructure must remain consistent with the longer term airport masterplan if true efficiency of investment is to be achieved, especially in these times of economic volatility.

Available Approaches

Available airport capacity is a function of the passenger service level offered. The airport has a number of choices to accommodate large temporary peaks in demand:-

• Permit significant reductions in passenger service levels through a ‘do minimum’ approach;
• Manage service levels to an acceptable but reduced standard by reviewing processes and investing in low cost/temporary methods to increase operational capacity ;
• Invest in new permanent infrastructure and resources to accommodate the temporary peaks in demand such that existing passenger service levels are maintained.

In terms of economic sustainability alone, options 1 and 2 above are likely to be the front runners, accepting that in certain instances option 3 could represent an opportunity to improve old or failing infrastructure.

In order to optimise existing infrastructure and review current processes for efficiency opportunities, it is necessary to understand the nature and pattern of these additional peaks in passenger demand. Decisions can then be made in terms of managing that demand as efficiently as possible, concentrating on three main areas;

1.  Surface access and car parking,
2.  Terminal operations and
3.  Airfield operations.

These are outlined below.

Surface access and car parking

Car parking demand might be little affected. However, interrogation of expected demands (e.g. in terms of passenger types) will identify whether car parking provision needs to be increased temporarily. This can be achieved cost effectively in a number of different ways, such as temporary off site block parking, displacement of staff parking and encouragement of modal shift for staff access.

Whilst impacts on passenger car parking demand might be limited, there may be a significant increase in public transport and event charter transport services. This may require airports to re-think how they operate and manage their airport terminal forecourts.

Airport operators should work in close collaboration with public transport providers and event organisers to develop jointly agreed travel plans which meet the expected passenger demands.

Terminal Operations

Terminal processes work in a chain and the capacity of the terminal system is only as great as the weakest link in that chain. Ideally all processes should be balanced, each providing equivalent capacity which can be expressed as either a processing rate through a particular facility (e.g. security screening) or an occupancy value for a particular facility (e.g. departure lounge).

Modelling of terminal areas will quickly establish the locations of current and future capacity bottlenecks. The airport should rigorously review its operational processes and dispense with inefficiencies by planning and allocating people and physical resources at each link in the chain in line with demand patterns and processing rates. Primary areas for operational efficiency review are check-in and security screening.

Major gains in capacity and passenger throughput efficiency can be made through:

• Availability of trained staff to tend queues
• Use of temporary check-in, passenger waiting, security or baggage reclaim buildings
• Security screening information well in advance of the security comb
• Strategically placed staff at the security comb to assist passengers
• Use of an off-airport processing facility, such as that used in Athens for the 2004 Olympics.

Airfield operations

Unless the airfield is already operating at saturation point, it is likely that the additional ATM charter traffic resulting from international sporting events can be effectively integrated into existing schedules by taking advantage of the quieter periods in the schedules outside of the typical morning and evening scheduled airline peaks.

When looking at airfield capacity issues we review/model three core components; runway, taxiway and apron. The apron is the airfield component most likely to suffer capacity constraints during the high but short term aircraft traffic peaks associated with major international sporting events. Temporary remote parking and alteration of existing stand operations and configurations can make significant capacity enhancements

Conclusion

Major international sporting events present short-term and extreme peaks in demand which can overload existing airport infrastructure. However, large-scale capital investment to meet such demand may leave airports with a legacy of over investment. Airports can often manage this peak in demand through careful operational planning and modelling in addition to temporary infrastructure development.

AECOM are very experienced in the physical and operational masterplanning of airports and planning transport facilities for major sporting, musical and religious events around the world, and are proud to have worked with many hub and regional airports from Hong Kong International to London Heathrow, Sydney to New York JFK and Taipei to Brisbane.

Alex Lake
Aviation Director (Europe)
AECOM
The Johnson Building
77 Hatton Garden
London EC1N 8JS
UK

Email: alex.lake@aecom.com
Web: www.aecom.com

 

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