Optimum design and operation of airport passenger terminal buildings

Abstract

The standard procedures for the design and operation of airport passenger terminal buildings (PTBs) often lead to either high operating and maintenance costs or passenger dissatisfaction. A new philosophy of planning, design, and operation that is based on optimum resource utilization and passenger flow management and control was initiated. An optimum resource utilization model was developed on the basis of important issues such as an early association of physical and operational plans, the stochastic nature of airport demand, the long-term costs of over- and undersupply of PTB facilities, performance measures, and utilization of scarce resources. Three submodels were developed as part of the optimum resource utilization model, that is, the simulation, optimization, and flow management and control models. An object-oriented simulation model, which consists of a set of simple submodels and nodes, was developed to perform as a real-world airport terminal. The optimization model will provide a list of optimum required resources for all predefined segments of the PTB. A real-time flow management and control model was developed, in which the PTB operator would be able to respond to preplanned or spontaneous events.