Overview of the Small Aircraft Transportation System Project Four Enabling Operating Capabilities

It has become evident that our commercial air transportation system is reaching its peak in terms of capacity, with numerous delays in the system and the demand still steadily increasing. NASA, the Federal Aviation Administration, and the National Consortium for Aviation Mobility have partnered together to aid in increasing the mobility throughout the United States through the Small Aircraft Transportation System project This project has been a five-year effort to provide the technical and economic basis for further national investment and policy decisions to support a small aircraft transportation system. The project vision has been to enable people and goods to have the convenience of on-demand point-to-point travel, anywhere, anytime for both personal and business travel. The project has focused its efforts on four key operating capabilities that have addressed new emerging technologies, procedures, and concepts to pave the way for small aircraft to operate in near all-weather conditions at virtually any runway in the United States. The focus of this paper is to provide an overview of the technical and operational feasibility of the four operating capabilities and explain how they can enable a small aircraft transportation system.