Evaluation and Optimization of Air Traffic Complexity Based on Resilience Metrics

Abstract

With the rapid growth of civil aviation, the increasing expansion of air traffic flow has brought serious challenges to the service capacity of the current airspace system, making the operation of the control sector increasingly complex. The accurate quantification of sector situational complexity is the basis for improving the service capability of airspace systems. The existing research on complexity ignores the resilience of the air traffic system in case of flight change, which cannot fully describe the dynamic characteristics of the air traffic situation. For this reason, a new air traffic complexity evaluation algorithm based on system resilience is proposed. Firstly, an air traffic situation network based on between-flight interaction is established. Then an overall sector complexity index based on network efficiency, average network failure rate, and average network recovery rate is built. Then, the complexity index is verified by analyzing the real radar number of ZSSSAR01 (sector 1 of Shanghai). By establishing a sector complexity optimization model, the complexity of sector air traffic and its volatility can be greatly reduced by changing the departure time of some flights. Finally, by optimizing the complexity of the sector, the workload of controllers is reduced, and the safety and efficiency of air traffic operations are improved.