Pilot perceptions of airspace complexity

The "free flight" concept of air traffic management has been suggested as a means of allowing aircraft operators to optimize heir flight paths and achieve greater operating efficiencies. It is also intended to relieve airspace congestion despite anticipated increases in the number of flight operations. Transitioning from centralized air traffic control to decentralized air traffic management involves a number of changes: (1) primary responsibility for strategic aircraft separation (those occurring any time beyond a few minutes in the future) resides with the pilots rather than with the air traffic controller; (2) in order to fulfill this responsibility, pilots need advanced airborne decision aides that detect, and help them resolve potential conflicts between aircraft; and (3) in order to accurately detect strategic conflicts, these decision aides (and their human users) need accurate intent information from other aircraft. This study is just the initial step in a series of studies that need to be done. Having demonstrated the value of the aide and, soon, identified the characteristics of the airspace that cause pilots difficulty, we then have to use those results to better understand how airborne conflict detection and resolution aides work in more realistic operational environments.