Airport Capacity Problem Southern California Transportation Alternatives LCDR Kirby and LT Burba

Introduction Southern Californias Airports are at Capacity Generally crowded airspace and crowded airports Model of major US airports Introduction of a High Speed Rail to reduce strain on Southern Californias airports

Mark Hansen, a UC Berkeley professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering and the Director of the National Center of Excellence for Aviation Operations Research: a bullet train could provide congestion relief at major airports like LAX and SFO where costly delays are high and rising by cutting the number of passengers traveling to and from Los Angeles and San Francisco by air. These delays due to airport congestion could benefit high-speed rail.National Center of Excellence for Aviation Operations Research

Methodology -Multi-commodity Flow model -Airports represented as nodes -Each node capacity based on the average of the peak air traffic (in aircraft) for five days, over 1 year (data from the FAAs Air Traffic Activity System Database) -These are the limiting constraints

Methodology (contd) Supply and demand: Set by a proportion determined by the population of the cities and the distance between them. The distance factor forces a preference for regional flights over longer ones (distance from mapsoftheworld.com). Validated against FAA database. Based on a Southwest type airline

Methodology (Contd) Flow is restricted, and then the model is run to see how many trains are needed to make up for reduced air carrying capacity. Train capacities assumed to be similar to 450 aircraft. Model will report infeasible until a acceptable number of trains is found.

Methodology (Contd) Model reports an infeasible solution until an acceptable number of high speed rail support is added This is done by adding train nodes until the model finds a solution. All costs based on time.

Next Three slides: Division of country into regions Sample airport to airport arcs (there are too many to show on the chart, 169 to be exact) Sample High Speed Rail set up. High Speed Rail does not replace air routes. It merely augments them.

MidWest SouthEast NorthEast Focus Area West

Train Network Linking San Diego, Las Vegas and Los Angeles

Sample Route LAXSTRT LAXEND SEASTRT SEAEND Capacity = # flights, Cost = 0 (time) Capacity = inf. flights, Cost = time of flight Capacity = # flights, Cost = 0 (time)

Sample Route with Train(added capacity) LAXSTRT LAXEND TRNSTRT TRNEND Capacity = # flights, Cost = 0 (time) Capacity = people. flights, Cost = time of train ride Capacity = inf, Cost = 30 (time) Dest. Train Sta. Dest. Apt. Capacity = inf, Cost = 30 (time)

Results

First Run Model cant handle capacity (thats good!). Only %55 of the total demand. Now, to add a train to a southern California arc (by adding train capacity) and see if that reduces the unmet demand. Goal is to reduce flights with the use of the trains. But, we are trying to show trains will make a difference in the first place.

Subsequent Runs Adding Three trains really didnt help. Only a change of 1% in the demand not met.

A comparison

% Interdiction vs. Demand not Met

Recommendations and Discussion

If We Only Had More Time… Account for the affect car commuters turned train commuters would have on the capacities of the trains Network expansion nationwide Cost in $$$ instead of time

One Last thing… what would happen if LA was leveled? Turns out, not much! (Almost the same as the previous slide)

Bibliography Federal Aviation Administration, Air Traffic Management System and Database: Institute of Transportation Studies, U.C. Berkeley: Los Angeles Airport News release: The National Center for Excellence for Aviation Operations Research: Maps of the World: ga.html ga.html The Van Allen Institute, High Speed Rail Capacity and Use: