A comparative analysis of departure metering at Paris (CDG) and Charlotte (CLT) airports

Abstract

© 2019 EUROCONTROL. All rights reserved. Departure metering has the potential to mitigate airport surface congestion and decrease flight delays. This paper considers several candidate departure metering techniques, including a trajectory-based optimization approach using a node-link model and three aggregate queue-based approaches (a scheduler based on NASA’s ATD-2 logic, an optimal control approach, and a robust control approach). The outcomes of these different approaches are compared for two major airports: Paris Charles De Gaulle airport (CDG) in Europe and Charlotte Douglas International airport (CLT) in the United States. Stochastic simulations are used to show that the robust control approach best accommodates operational uncertainties, while all the approaches considered yield higher taxi-out time savings at CLT compared to CDG.