Diagnostic Throughput Factor Analysis Tool for En-Route Airspace

Today’s National Airspace System (NAS) is facing a challenge of dealing with an increasingly larger number of flight operations. To address this, the Next Generation Air Transportation System (NextGen) is introduced by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) to improve the efficiency and safety of the NAS. Currently, the performance of the NAS is mainly measured using the delay-based metrics that cannot capture the positive aspects of the performance and level of utilization of the NAS. To address this issue, a diagnostic throughput factor analysis tool is proposed to analyze and quantify the factors that have greater responsibility for poor/better regions/times of performance of the en-route airspace using the concept of throughput. Through a function-level comparison with other applications such as ground transportation, manufacturing, and wireless communication, major factors affecting the NAS’s throughput performance are identified as Monitor Alert Parameter violation, aircraft conflict, metering, convective weather, and wind. These factors are quantitatively analyzed using the real traffic (scheduled and actual) and weather (convective weather and wind) data with the Future ATM Concepts Evaluation Tool. The proposed diagnostic throughput factor analysis tool is validated by applying it to various sectors and centers in the en-route airspace of the NAS. This tool can help the Air Traffic Controllers or the FAA improve the efficiency of airspace operations, leading to economic and environmental benefits.