Airspace Operations Lab @ NASA Ames

A human-in-the-loop simulation investigated how well terminal-area air traffic controllers could manage arrival traffic flying optimized profile descents on RNAV/RNP routes, while maintaining high throughput under varying environmental conditions. Scenarios were investigated with and without advisory tools and improved displays, and also examined how well controllers could cope with off-nominal situations such as ties at merge points. The role of an arrival management planner responsible for issuing path changes to aircraft upon entry to the terminal area was also investigated. The results show that in the tools condition, controllers kept aircraft on their routes while maintaining similar throughput levels to the no-tools condition. Route deviations occurred in the no-tools condition. While the absence of advanced tools resulted in slightly higher workload, the average controller workload ratings were low for both the no-tools and tools conditions. With the currently implemented advisory tools and displays, participant controllers in both conditions were able to absorb approximately one minute of delay with speed adjustments alone. This work is part of ongoing research on operations in super-density terminal airspace.