Keeping traffic moving efficiently on airport taxiways and reducing emissions

30 January 2012

Airports strive for ever more eco-efficient ground operations including safe taxiway routing for pilots, all-weather guidance between the terminal gate and the runway, and control of aircraft and vehicles. Airbus ProSky is responding to this demand by complementing its Air Traffic Management (ATM) offerings with a powerful airport surface management system (SMAN) for Air Traffic Control centres worldwide.

SMAN was designed for environmental efficiency by the German company ATRiCS and is now offered through Airbus ProSky. A unique feature of this airport surface management system is that it automatically switches on the green taxiway lights in front of the aircraft as it moves forward, to illuminate the correct route ahead for the pilot to follow. Overall, the system reduces taxi time and maximises airport capacity and aircraft throughput, while its intelligent predictive guidance also prevents runway incursions and a ‘wrong-turn’. SMAN thus smoothes overall traffic flow and facilitates a continuous taxi speed. This results in less queuing, less ‘stop-and-go’, and of course, lower CO2 emissions.

“Airbus ProSky and ATRiCS share a common goal for improving the efficiency of our airport and aviation systems,” said Wolfgang Hatzack, Chief Executive Officer of ATRiCS. “Our deployments in Incheon, Kuala Lumpur, Dubai, Frankfurt, Zurich and Düsseldorf demonstrate the safety and cost benefits for the global aviation industry with Airbus ProSky.”

Eric Stefanello, Chief Executive Officer of Airbus ProSky said: “Airbus ProSky is bringing together intelligent ATM components which offer the highest level of performance improvements.” He added: “ATRiCS is a proven leader and innovator in advanced artificial intelligence to assist controllers, and we are delighted to have them as part of our team.”

Airbus ProSky, a subsidiary company of Airbus, is dedicated to improving the performance and efficiency of global ATM. By drawing on the operational know-how throughout Airbus itself, and in particular, bringing together the expertise of Airbus’ subsidiaries – Metron Aviation in the US and Quovadis in France, Airbus ProSky offers more than the sum of these parts to provide the world’s best ATM components to maximize value, efficiency, capacity and environmental sustainability. Part of this team, ATRiCS, based in Freiburg, Germany, is a leader in improving traffic efficiency and controller productivity at airports.