Research On Sector Capacity In Operation Based On Traffic Flow Pattern

With the rapid increasing number of aircrafts as well as factors such as complex weather conditions and military activities, the phenomenon of flight delay is becoming more and more severe and imposing great pressure on air traffic management. Meanwhile, the limited airspace resource is restricting the growth of air traffic flow. The conflict between air traffic demand and supply is deepening; therefore the “air traffic congestion” problem worsens. As a fundamental parameter for air traffic operation management, sector capacity will become the focus of ATS units and civil aviation authorities. Accurate and reasonable assessment of sector capacity can significantly impact the implementation of air traffic management.To solve this problem, firstly, this paper analyzes and compares several commonly used evaluation methods of sector capacity. It combines the inspiration of ground congestion phenomenon research and points out the basic assumption that sector capacity is the traffic flow at the time of sector congestion. Then, it puts forward the capacity evaluation method based on sector traffic flow pattern. Using the radar data in Xiamen sector, this paper describes the overall sector traffic situation in terms of the characteristics of traffic flow and collects three statistics parameters: segment density, sector flight status and location points. It uses K-means clustering method to form a variety of traffic patterns, and analyzes the sector communication load comparatively. On this basis, it gets the sector capacity value of corresponding pattern. Finally, this paper uses dynamic time warping algorithm to achieve recognition of the traffic flow pattern and calculation of sector capacity, then explores the differences between capacity evaluation results.This paper proposes to cluster traffic patterns before calculating sector capacity and summarizes a calculation method of sector capacity in operation based on traffic flow pattern.This method can be applied to the other sectors. Obtaining the accurate value of each sector by analyzing the traffic situation is beneficial for providing timely and effective control services by each department and ensures the safety and accessibility of air traffic.