Sustainable mobility concepts: Optimisation of flight movements in Europe

Many current problems in air traffic are related to the number of aircraft movements. Overcrowding in the airspace, difficult coordination at airports, high emissions of noise and pollutants as well as complexity of airlines are side effects of too many aircraft movements. This study examines the extent to which the number of flight movements in Europe can be reduced without change in transport performance. For this purpose, the number of flight movement for a European network of the 140 most frequently flown serviced routes will be optimised. The reference date is November 17th, 2017. It shows that with the same passenger transport performance, the number of flight movements can be reduced to 1/3 of the current level (from 2.040 flights per day to 738 flights per day). In some cases, the quality of the connections can even be improved because all flights in the optimised network are coordinated. This proves that the current air traffic structure has considerable weak points. There are too many redundant aircraft movements. Our proposed reform measures can contribute to the needed reduction in the number of aircraft movements without reducing passenger transport services and travel quality.