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Article
Publication date: 28 September 2023

Álvaro Rodríguez-Sanz and Luis Rubio-Andrada

An important and challenging question for air transportation regulators and airport operators is the definition and specification of airport capacity. Annual capacity is used for…

Abstract

Purpose

An important and challenging question for air transportation regulators and airport operators is the definition and specification of airport capacity. Annual capacity is used for long-term planning purposes as a degree of available service volume, but it poses several inefficiencies when measuring the true throughput of the system because of seasonal and daily variations of traffic. Instead, airport throughput is calculated or estimated for a short period of time, usually one hour. This brings about a mismatch: air traffic forecasts typically yield annual volumes, whereas capacity is measured on hourly figures. To manage the right balance between airport capacity and demand, annual traffic volumes must be converted into design hour volumes, so that they can be compared with the true throughput of the system. This comparison is a cornerstone in planning new airport infrastructures, as design-period parameters are important for airport planners in anticipating where and when congestion occurs. Although the design hour for airport traffic has historically had a number of definitions, it is necessary to improve the way air traffic design hours are selected. This study aims to provide an empirical analysis of airport capacity and demand, specifically focusing on insights related to air traffic design hours and the relationship between capacity and delay.

Design/methodology/approach

By reviewing the empirical relationships between hourly and annual air traffic volumes and between practical capacity and delay at 50 European airports during the period 2004–2021, this paper discusses the problem of defining a suitable peak hour for capacity evaluation purposes. The authors use information from several data sources, including EUROCONTROL, ACI and OAG. This study provides functional links between design hours and annual volumes for different airport clusters. Additionally, the authors appraise different daily traffic distribution patterns and their variation by hour of the day.

Findings

The clustering of airports with respect to their capacity, operational and traffic characteristics allows us to discover functional relationships between annual traffic and the percentage of traffic in the design hour. These relationships help the authors to propose empirical methods to derive expected traffic in design hours from annual volumes. The main conclusion is that the percentage of total annual traffic that is concentrated at the design hour maintains a predictable behavior through a “potential” adjustment with respect to the volume of annual traffic. Moreover, the authors provide an experimental link between capacity and delay so that peak hour figures can be related to factors that describe the quality of traffic operations.

Originality/value

The functional relationships between hourly and annual air traffic volumes and between capacity and delay, can be used to properly assess airport expansion projects or to optimize resource allocation tasks. This study offers new evidence on the nature of airport capacity and the dynamics of air traffic design hours and delay.

Details

Aircraft Engineering and Aerospace Technology, vol. 96 no. 1
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1748-8842

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 27 January 2012

Felipe Mata, José Luis García‐Dorado, Javier Aracil and Jorge E. López de Vergara

This study aims to assess whether similar user populations in the Internet produce similar geographical traffic destination patterns on a per‐country basis.

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Abstract

Purpose

This study aims to assess whether similar user populations in the Internet produce similar geographical traffic destination patterns on a per‐country basis.

Design/methodology/approach

The authors collected a country‐wide NetFlow trace, which encompasses the whole Spanish academic network. Such a trace comprises several similar campus networks in terms of population size and structure. To compare their behaviors, the authors propose a mixture model, which is primarily based on the Zipf‐Mandelbrot power law to capture the heavy‐tailed nature of the per‐country traffic distribution. Then, factor analysis is performed to understand the relation between the response variable, number of bytes or packets per day, with dependent variables such as the source IP network, traffic direction, and country.

Findings

Surprisingly, the results show that the geographical distribution is strongly dependent on the source IP network. Furthermore, even though there are thousands of users in a typical campus network, it turns out that the aggregation level which is required to observe a stable geographical pattern is even larger.

Practical implications

Based on these findings, conclusions drawn for one network cannot be directly extrapolated to different ones. Therefore, ISPs' traffic measurement campaigns should include an extensive set of networks to cope with the space diversity, and also encompass a significant period of time due to the large transient time.

Originality/value

Current state of the art includes some analysis of geographical patterns, but not comparisons between networks with similar populations. Such comparison can be useful for the design of content distribution networks and the cost‐optimization of peering agreements.

Article
Publication date: 23 May 2022

Álvaro Rodríguez-Sanz and Luis Rubio-Andrada

Airport capacity constraints lead to operational congestion and delays, which have become major threats to the aviation industry. They impose large costs on airlines and their…

Abstract

Purpose

Airport capacity constraints lead to operational congestion and delays, which have become major threats to the aviation industry. They impose large costs on airlines and their passengers. Uncertainty in demand or unexpected events can cause a mismatch between capacity and demand, resulting in either capacity oversupply, with a decrease in efficiency, or airport congestion over an extended period. Moreover, airport capacity is rather difficult to define due to its multifaceted and dynamic nature, and it depends both on the available infrastructure and on operating procedures. Additionally, traditional capacity management methods do not consider relevant behavioral economic challenges to conventional analysis, particularly failure of the expected utility hypotheses and dependence of valuations on reference points. This study aims to develop a preliminary framework to include economic concepts when evaluating expansions of airport capacity.

Design/methodology/approach

This paper reviews major opportunities in airport demand and capacity management from an economic perspective while appraising the challenges involved in airport capacity expansion processes that have not been fully completely in past studies. Although welfare economics provides the conceptual foundations for demand/capacity analyses, the authors integrate the findings regarding capacity definition, uncertainty management and behavioral economics into standard economics to guide the measurement of the airport capacity expansion problem.

Findings

The authors obtain several insights regarding airport capacity and demand management. First, airport capacity is a complex metric when evaluating airport expansion, and it depends both on the available infrastructure and on operating procedures. Furthermore, airport throughput is highly conditioned by factors that shape capacity and delay and shows significant variability when these factors are modified. Second, a marginal change in capacity at congested airports may have a great impact on demand distribution, airline competition, aircraft types, fares, operating revenues, route map and other characteristics of a given airport. Behavior after capacity expansion is highly reliant on the slot allocation models. Additionally, overall social welfare is usually affected after changes in infrastructure in terms of increased connectivity, economic benefits and negative externalities, including noise and local pollution. Third, on-time performance is clearly nonlinear, and thus sensitive to variations in demand and capacity. Finally, airport capacity and demand management involve a trade-off between mitigating congestion and maximizing capacity utilization, so decision-making tools are required to support and enhance policy and managerial choices. Three main challenges arise when developing new methods for evaluating airport expansions: the definition of capacity, the management of uncertainty in demand and the need to consider economic concepts.

Originality/value

This paper explores and produces an in-depth understanding of the problem of airport capacity and demand balance. The authors propose a preliminary framework that considers the challenges that have been previously identified and that, particularly, provides an economic perspective for airport capacity expansion processes. This framework is completed with a theoretical model to help policymakers and airport operators when faced with a capacity development decision.

Details

Aircraft Engineering and Aerospace Technology, vol. 94 no. 9
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1748-8842

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 1 June 1996

Karen Stephenson and David Lewin

Public policy which controls and seeks to correct employment discrimination is now in its fourth decade in the USA. Organizations have made strides in complying with such policies…

4279

Abstract

Public policy which controls and seeks to correct employment discrimination is now in its fourth decade in the USA. Organizations have made strides in complying with such policies through their hiring practices and in employee development and training programmes. While laws such as the Civil Rights Act and programmes such as EEO and AA have high aims and lofty claims, in practice they miss the mark in organizations. Research indicates that the nature of the work relationship is constrained by both network and hierarchical forms of organization. Suggests that policy is predicated only on the latter and that innovation may lie in the former. Finds that understanding and managing the networks in organizations may be used to augment existing programmes in achieving non‐discriminatory or “fair” employment practices.

Details

International Journal of Manpower, vol. 17 no. 4/5
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0143-7720

Keywords

Abstract

Details

Handbook of Transport Geography and Spatial Systems
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-1-615-83253-8

Open Access
Article
Publication date: 22 May 2023

Edmund Baffoe-Twum, Eric Asa and Bright Awuku

Background: Geostatistics focuses on spatial or spatiotemporal datasets. Geostatistics was initially developed to generate probability distribution predictions of ore grade in the…

Abstract

Background: Geostatistics focuses on spatial or spatiotemporal datasets. Geostatistics was initially developed to generate probability distribution predictions of ore grade in the mining industry; however, it has been successfully applied in diverse scientific disciplines. This technique includes univariate, multivariate, and simulations. Kriging geostatistical methods, simple, ordinary, and universal Kriging, are not multivariate models in the usual statistical function. Notwithstanding, simple, ordinary, and universal kriging techniques utilize random function models that include unlimited random variables while modeling one attribute. The coKriging technique is a multivariate estimation method that simultaneously models two or more attributes defined with the same domains as coregionalization.

Objective: This study investigates the impact of populations on traffic volumes as a variable. The additional variable determines the strength or accuracy obtained when data integration is adopted. In addition, this is to help improve the estimation of annual average daily traffic (AADT).

Methods procedures, process: The investigation adopts the coKriging technique with AADT data from 2009 to 2016 from Montana, Minnesota, and Washington as primary attributes and population as a controlling factor (second variable). CK is implemented for this study after reviewing the literature and work completed by comparing it with other geostatistical methods.

Results, observations, and conclusions: The Investigation employed two variables. The data integration methods employed in CK yield more reliable models because their strength is drawn from multiple variables. The cross-validation results of the model types explored with the CK technique successfully evaluate the interpolation technique's performance and help select optimal models for each state. The results from Montana and Minnesota models accurately represent the states' traffic and population density. The Washington model had a few exceptions. However, the secondary attribute helped yield an accurate interpretation. Consequently, the impact of tourism, shopping, recreation centers, and possible transiting patterns throughout the state is worth exploring.

Details

Emerald Open Research, vol. 1 no. 5
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 2631-3952

Keywords

Open Access
Article
Publication date: 11 March 2022

Edmund Baffoe-Twum, Eric Asa and Bright Awuku

Background: The annual average daily traffic (AADT) data from road segments are critical for roadway projects, especially with the decision-making processes about operations…

Abstract

Background: The annual average daily traffic (AADT) data from road segments are critical for roadway projects, especially with the decision-making processes about operations, travel demand, safety-performance evaluation, and maintenance. Regular updates help to determine traffic patterns for decision-making. Unfortunately, the luxury of having permanent recorders on all road segments, especially low-volume roads, is virtually impossible. Consequently, insufficient AADT information is acquired for planning and new developments. A growing number of statistical, mathematical, and machine-learning algorithms have helped estimate AADT data values accurately, to some extent, at both sampled and unsampled locations on low-volume roadways. In some cases, roads with no representative AADT data are resolved with information from roadways with similar traffic patterns.

Methods: This study adopted an integrative approach with a combined systematic literature review (SLR) and meta-analysis (MA) to identify and to evaluate the performance, the sources of error, and possible advantages and disadvantages of the techniques utilized most for estimating AADT data. As a result, an SLR of various peer-reviewed articles and reports was completed to answer four research questions.

Results: The study showed that the most frequent techniques utilized to estimate AADT data on low-volume roadways were regression, artificial neural-network techniques, travel-demand models, the traditional factor approach, and spatial interpolation techniques. These AADT data-estimating methods' performance was subjected to meta-analysis. Three studies were completed: R squared, root means square error, and mean absolute percentage error. The meta-analysis results indicated a mixed summary effect: 1. all studies were equal; 2. all studies were not comparable. However, the integrated qualitative and quantitative approach indicated that spatial-interpolation (Kriging) methods outperformed the others.

Conclusions: Spatial-interpolation methods may be selected over others to generate accurate AADT data by practitioners at all levels for decision making. Besides, the resulting cross-validation statistics give statistics like the other methods' performance measures.

Details

Emerald Open Research, vol. 1 no. 5
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 2631-3952

Keywords

Abstract

Details

The Handbook of Road Safety Measures
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-1-84855-250-0

Article
Publication date: 12 June 2014

Paz Moral, Pilar Gonzalez and Beatriz Plaza

Online advertising such as Google AdWords gives small and medium-sized enterprises access to new markets at reduced costs. The purpose of this paper is to analyse the visibility…

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Abstract

Purpose

Online advertising such as Google AdWords gives small and medium-sized enterprises access to new markets at reduced costs. The purpose of this paper is to analyse the visibility and performance of a website and to test the effectiveness of online marketing using the data provided by Google Analytics.

Design/methodology/approach

The authors use a class of econometric time series models with unobservable components, Structural Time Series Models (STSM). The authors allow for time-varying trends to take into account the non-stationary behaviour displayed by time series. The authors illustrate the model using daily data from a local tourist website. Three specific questions are addressed: do paid keywords campaigns increase the volume and quality of search traffic? Do paid keywords affect the volume and quality of the unpaid traffic? How do paid and unpaid keywords perform?

Findings

The results for the case study show that: first, online campaigns affect traffic volume positively but their effectiveness on traffic quality is uncertain; second, paid keywords do not affect the volume and quality of unpaid traffic; third, the increase in traffic volume is not always due to the paid keywords and the lowest quality visits come from paid traffic.

Practical implications

This analysis may help webmasters to design successful online advertising strategies.

Originality/value

This study contributes to the development of user-friendly methodologies to monitor website performance. The analysis shows that STSM is a suitable methodology to test the effectiveness of online campaigns and to assess the changes over time in the performance of a website.

Details

Online Information Review, vol. 38 no. 4
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1468-4527

Keywords

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