ReturnDevelopment of a 21st Century Small Aircraft Transportation System
Dr. Brent D. Bowen
University of Nebraska Omaha
Dr. Bruce J. Holmes
Langley Research Center, Virginia
and
Frederick Hansen
University of Nebraska Omaha
ABSTRACT
The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), U.S. Department of Transportation, Federal Aviation Administration, industry stakeholders, and academia, have joined forces to pursue the NASA National General Aviation Roadmap leading to a Small Aircraft Transportation System (SATS). This strategic undertaking has a 25-year goal to bring the next-generation technologies and improve travel between remote communities and transportation centers in urban areas by utilizing the nation's 5,400 public use general aviation airports. To facilitate this initiative, a comprehensive upgrade of public infrastructure must be planned, coordinated, and implemented within the framework of the national air transportation system. The Nebraska NASA EPSCoR Program has proposed to deliver research support in key public infrastructure areas in coordination with the General Aviation Program Office at the NASA Langley Research Center. Ultimately, SATS may permit tripling aviation system throughput capacity by tapping the underutilized general aviation facilities to achieve the national goal of doorstep-to-destination travel at four times the speed of highways for the nation's suburban, rural, and remote communities.
For more information:
http://www.unomaha.edu/~unoai/sats/
402-554-3095
Development of a 21st Century Small Aircraft Transportation System
The NASA-led National General Aviation Roadmap established a framework for coordinating public and private sector investments leading to development of a national Small Aircraft Transportation System (SATS). The Roadmap goal is to enable "doorstep-to-destination travel at four times the speed of highways, to 25 percent of the nation's suburban, rural, and remote communities in 10 years and more than 90 percent within 25 years."
Two essential components of the Small Aircraft Transportation System are "SATS Aircraft" and "SATS Airports". A "SATS Aircraft" refers to small airplanes and helicopters that employ new avionics, airframe, pilot training, and engine technologies derived from ongoing programs in support of the NASA Roadmap. "SATS Airports" will be drawn from the Nation's 5400 public-use airports equipped for near all-weather operational support of the SATS aircraft. Two major NASA-led public-private partnerships have been developing the prototype SATS aircraft. The Advanced General Aviation Transport Experiments (AGATE) and the General Aviation Propulsion (GAP) partnerships are expected to complete the development of the first generation SATS aircraft by 2001.
The development of SATS aircraft however, is only one part of NASA's vision. The next step in the Roadmap involves planning for investments in infrastructure technologies. The current NASA Throughput Roadmap established a goal to "triple the aviation system throughput, in all weather conditions, within 10 years, while maintaining safety." This goal can only be met by tapping the Nation's underutilized airspace and airports.
The existing General Aviation airport infrastructure represents a vast, underutilized capacity for the nation. Of the 5400 public use airports in the United States, seventy airports serve approximately 90 percent of the air carrier passengers while another 410 airports serve the remaining 10 percent. These 480 airports however, cannot provide timely, convenient, and affordable air service to the numerous rural and remote communities throughout the nation. By expanding all-weather access to other public use airports, the National Airspace System capacity (measured in annual seat-departures) could be increased by a factor of ten compared to the existing commercial hub-and-spoke system. This increased accessibility and throughput of a more fully utilized infrastructure would contribute substantially to the National Airspace System safety, cost, and efficiency. Virtually every small community in the nation has the potential to be served by SATS.
The term "Communities served by SATS .." is defined in the Roadmap to mean:
To facilitate this initiative, a comprehensive upgrade of public infrastructure must be planned, coordinated, and implemented within the framework of the national air transportation system. The Nebraska NASA EPSCoR Program has proposed to deliver research support in key public infrastructure areas in coordination with the General Aviation Program Office at NASA's Langley Research Center. The Nebraska SATS project involves a multi-disciplinary research cluster that will bridge the gap between NASA's technical expertise and Center-requested expertise in the areas of policy research for public change. Additional information is available at the website ] http://www.unomaha.edu/~unoai/sats/
The Nebraska SATS cluster will provide research in four areas: (1) systemic change and innovation in public infrastructure; (2) public finance and economics; (3) airport change, compliance, rural demographics and pilot training; and (4) public policy, intergovernmental, and regulatory issues. Each sub-cluster has an identified faculty researcher who will report to the principal investigator, Dr. Brent Bowen.
Sub-cluster one will focus on two areas. The first will entail the development of a formal systems engineering model for SATS implementation with Nebraska serving as a test bed. The second critical set of cluster activities will focus on the examination of SATS as an innovation. As an innovation, SATS can be studied much like any other innovation. Goals of this sub-cluster include the development of the formal systems engineering requirements for the SATS model, an analysis of alternative SATS target population levels, the market areas served by the SATS airports, and the speed and cost of innovation diffusion.
Sub-cluster two will investigate the various financial options available to the federal government to build the SATS infrastructure in a manner that is both financially and administratively sustainable in the long term and is palatable to state and local beneficiaries. The group will also develop a general conceptual framework that could be applied to specific airport projects to quantify both the direct and indirect benefits and costs to stakeholders.
Sub-cluster three will examine state and local airport planning for SATS implementation. In the short term, it is crucial to develop a statewide conceptual framework within which to develop the possible impact of the SATS airport program on the National Plan of Integrated Airport System (NPIAS). Nebraska, for example, has nearly 100 public-use airports, many of which will become an integral part of the SATS airport infrastructure. It is also necessary to establish a Nebraska SATS Airport Compliance and Readiness Committee and a multi-state consortia.
An additional three cluster support components will provide a mechanism to address crucial areas of support for the SATS sub-clusters. The public policy research and planning component will initially provide a framework to respond to the evolving SATS concept. The public outreach and education component will serve key NASA goals of public and educational involvement in all sponsored research. Finally, the Native American support component will expand on an area of Nebraska NASA EPSCoR focus already in progress and supported by NASA Headquarters.
The first generation aircraft, engines, and avionics have been designed and an improved flight training program to produce private pilots with instrument ratings is underway. The Nebraska NASA EPSCoR research group will be working on implementation and infrastructure issues to help bring together SATS aircraft, SATS airports, and the requisite agencies and users. As we enter the 21st century, SATS will substantially improve personal mobility, providing access to ten times as many destinations as is possible in today's hub and spoke air transportation system and at four times the speed possible on today's highways.
REFERENCES
Holmes, B. (1999, January). NASA Aeronautics Enterprise National General Aviation
Roadmap for Pillar II Revolutionary Leaps for Goal #7. Presented at the National Research Council Transportation Research Board, Washington, D.C.
Bowen, B., et al. (1999, March). NASA Nebraska EPSCoR Preparation Grant: Year 1. University of Nebraska at Omaha, Omaha, NE.