INVESTIGATION OF THE IMPACT OF THE AIR TRAFFIC ROUTE CONFIGURATIONS ON SECTOR CAPACITY

Airspace constraints and controller workload are among the limiting factors of airspace capacity. One of these constraints is the network structure of Air Traffic Services (ATS) routes which is related to the configuration of flight paths, the presence of intersecting routes or conflict points, and the intersection angle. Improved sector capacity can be achieved through air route network development which limits the number of conflicts involving major traffic flows. In order to reduce the number of conflicts, the route configurations can be changed and merged in a single point. In this direction, two different models have been developed through fast time simulation to measure the effect of intersection of the unidirectional flight paths at three different points and one point on the sector capacity. Under the specified conditions, it is observed that the three intersecting routes at one point increased the average delay time by 15.9 min. and decreased the capacity by 20% according to the three intersecting routes at three different points. As a result of the study, it is concluded that the route configurations are one of the important factors affecting the average delay and sector capacity.