Automated Traffic Control for Smart Landing Facilities

Abstract

The Small Aircraft Transportation System (SATS) is a partnership between the FAA, the NASA, US aviation companies, universities and state and local aviation officials. The purpose of SATS is to develop a system to handle future increase in Air Traffic, reduce time-travel, develop automation in Air Traffic Control (ATC) and make better use of small aircraft and underused airports. The Smart Landing Facility (SLF) is an important part of the program. The SLF is a small airport upgraded with equipment to support SATS aircraft. Among the SLF equipment, SATS needs new detection equipment, and eventually automation.

This thesis investigates different techniques to avoid data collision in aircraft radar responses, and to reduce delays between landings and take offs. First, the paper shows how and when the radar receiver can separate two overlapped radar responses. Second, to avoid transponders responses overlapping, requirements in terms of aircraft safety distance are computed, different conflicts in air traffic around the SLF are examined and a solution is proposed for each case. And finally, the thesis investigates how far SATS can go in developing an automatic ATC system and what the role of future human operator will be in ATC.