Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Study of Planning, Design and Operations of Airport is termed as Airport Engineering. All these
elements need to be cost effective and provide safe transfer of goods and passengers.
ICAO
Safety is the overriding requirement in aviation. Standardisation is one of the means to achieve
it. In the case of airports, it is standardisation of facilities, ground equipment and procedures.
The only justification for differences is to match the types of aircraft that may be expected to
use the airports. It is, of course, necessary for the standards to be appropriate and to be agreed
by the aviation community.
International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO) adopted Annex 14-Aerodromes to the Convention
on 29th May 1951. Annex 14 provides the required set of standards for aerodromes used by
international air transport. The Annex contains information for planning, designing andoperating
airports.
Airport Demand
The population and population density of the city or region being served.
The economic character of the city
The proximity of the airport to other airports
Whether the airport acts as a hub for air transport routes.
Annual passenger enplanements and aircraft operations are directly related to city size; however
two cities approx. equal in population may have significantly different airports need due to
difference in the social and economic character of the city.
Industrial cities tend to generate much less aviation activity than centres of government,
education and finance
National forecasts
Analytical models that relate air travel to some combinations of variables such as air
fares, travel time, city population, and social economic characteristic of a city. See next
slide for more explanation.
Convenience to users
Availability of Land and Land cost
Design and Layout of Airport
Airspace Obstruction
Engineering Factors
Social and Environmental Factors
Availability of Users
Atmospheric Conditions
Hazards due to Birds
Coordination with other Airports
Convenience to Users
Ideally an airport should be located near the centre of the cities, but problem of air
obstruction and land cost rule out this possibility.
Amount of airport use is sensitive to the ratio of the ground travel time to total journey time.
Travel time is more important measure of convenience, thus a relatively remote potential
airport site should not be ruled out if it is conveniently located near a major highway or other
surface transportation facility.
The amount of land required will depend on the length and number of runways, lateral
clearances, and areas required for buildings, aprons, automobile parking and circulation, and
so forth.
In general, for new airports in large cities around 10,000 acres (4050 hectares) of land is
required. Basic utility airports (small airports) may require less than 40 hectares.
It is important that sufficient land be acquired for future expansion. Failure to do so could
mean that a convenient airport site need to shut due to limitations in airport operations from
an unexpandable runway or inadequate space for aircraft or passenger handling
In considering alternate potential airport sites, the basic layout and design essentially should
be constant. (this is necessary for passenger convenience)
Runways should be oriented in order to take advantage of prevailing winds.
no way interferes
Engineering Factors
Availability of Utilities
Atmospheric Condition
Peculiar atmospheric conditions such as fog, smoke, snow, or glare may rule out the use of
some potential airport sites.
Several flights in the recent years have been delayed due to volcanic ash. The volcanic ash
may fail the jet engines if the aircraft is flown in the plumes of volcanic ash. The volcanic ash
can choke the engine of the aircraft due to the presence of sand, glass and rock particles
present in the dense clouds of volcanic ash.
Aircrafts impact with birds ad bird ingestion into turbine engines have caused numerous air
disasters.
Airports should not be situated near bird habitats or natural preserves and feeding grounds.
At certain potential sites, special works such as filling of ponds and closing of dumps may be
required to ensure that birds will not present a hazard to aircraft flights.
Studies of aviation activity in heavily populated metropolitan areas indicate that more than one
major airport will be required in order to meet future air travel needs.
Where two or more large cities are closely spaced (e.g. Baltimore and Washington D.C.)
individual airport requirements must be determined in relation to the needs of the entire
metropolitan area, and each airport must be considered as a part of a total system.