"...The similarity between a motor race and an airport runway was first observed by Peter Tomlinson, head of aviation data solutions at NATS, while attending a workshop on cross-industry collaboration at McLaren's UK technology center three years ago.....
...It became clear that the pit-stop in a race track, with cars coming in, changing tyres and refueling and going out again actually is pretty similar to an aircraft arriving at the airport, parking at the gate, passengers getting off, refueling and going out," said the air traffic veteran, who has over 30 years experience in the industry.....
...But now, says Tomlinson, in place of a race strategist the system is operated by Heathrow's air traffic control, and instead of a circle the airport's network of runways and taxi lanes are represented by a simple rectangle -- enabling planes to be guided around the airport with greater ease and accuracy once they've landed.....
....The system is now in its "proof of concept" stage and hopes are high that it will be used by airports around the world within a year.
"Think in terms of the environmental benefits of that," enthused Tomlinson. "Large airports with about 1300 to 1400 flights a day - if you save just one minute of taxi time per flight on average, that equates to one day's worth of taxi time - and that's how much we could save using McLaren's technology."
Posts: 1,684
By: nJayM - 27th August 2011 at 00:25
From pit-stop to take-off: How F1 is changing the future of air travel
http://edition.cnn.com/2011/TECH/innovation/08/24/f1.air.traffic.control/index.html
"...The similarity between a motor race and an airport runway was first observed by Peter Tomlinson, head of aviation data solutions at NATS, while attending a workshop on cross-industry collaboration at McLaren's UK technology center three years ago.....
...It became clear that the pit-stop in a race track, with cars coming in, changing tyres and refueling and going out again actually is pretty similar to an aircraft arriving at the airport, parking at the gate, passengers getting off, refueling and going out," said the air traffic veteran, who has over 30 years experience in the industry.....
...But now, says Tomlinson, in place of a race strategist the system is operated by Heathrow's air traffic control, and instead of a circle the airport's network of runways and taxi lanes are represented by a simple rectangle -- enabling planes to be guided around the airport with greater ease and accuracy once they've landed.....
....The system is now in its "proof of concept" stage and hopes are high that it will be used by airports around the world within a year.
"Think in terms of the environmental benefits of that," enthused Tomlinson. "Large airports with about 1300 to 1400 flights a day - if you save just one minute of taxi time per flight on average, that equates to one day's worth of taxi time - and that's how much we could save using McLaren's technology."