Three Dimensional strongSectorstrong Design with Optimal Number of strongSectorsstrong.pdfVIP

Three Dimensional Sector Design with Optimal Number of Sectors Min Xue∗ University of California at Santa Cruz, Moffett Field, CA 94035 In the national airspace system, sectors get overloaded due to high traffic demand and in- efficient airspace designs. Overloads can be eliminated in some cases by redesigning sector boundaries. This paper extends the Voronoi-based sector design method by automati- cally selecting the number of sectors, allowing three-dimensional partitions, and enforcing traffic pattern conformance. The method was used to design sectors at Fort-Worth and Indianapolis centers for current traffic scenarios. Results show that new designs can elimi- nate overloaded sectors, although not in all cases, reduce the number of necessary sectors, and conform to major traffic patterns. Overall, the new methodology produces enhanced and efficient sector designs. Nomenclature M average sector dwell time, minute PI intersection proximity, 1 PD dominant flow proximity, 1 Ns aircraft count of short dwell, 1 Na average aircraft count in a sector, 1 Vp variance of sector peak aircraft count, % T dwell time of a flight , minute I. Introduction In the national airspace system, high traffic demand and inefficient airspace designs cause overloaded sectors. Because some overloads can be eliminated by redesigning sector boundaries, the congested sectors impose unnecessary delays and traffic rerouting. These problems become worse when traffic patterns and demands fluctuate. An automatic algorithm