Density based Management Concept for Urban Air Traffic

Abstract

In this paper we proposes a density-based airspace management system for future U-Space. The concept focusses on the integration of new airspace users (e.g., UAS and Urban Air Taxis) into uncontrolled airspace (here airspace G). The advantage of the proposed concept is that it opens up the airspace equally for lowly equipped and highly-equipped UAS. The concept gives incentives for UAS manufacturers and operators to invest in performance relevant technology, but doesn’t exclude lowly equipped airspace users from entering the U-Space airspace. The concept behind this approach relies on efficient airspace segmentation and UAS performance modelling. Based on airspace characteristics (e.g. ground class, geofences, U-Space service availability, occurrence of VFR-traffic or other non-cooperative airspace users) the airspace is segmented into cells of similar requirements. Generally, each airspace user is modelled by an ellipsoid defining its individual performance parameters with regard to navigation, communication and the capability to detect other airspace users (cooperatively and uncooperatively). The lower the overall performance, the larger the resulting safety ellipsoid will be for the aircraft. As a result, an airspace cell might either be used solely by few aircraft with a large ellipsoid – reaching the cell’s capacity – or several aircraft with smaller ellipsoids. This results in an airspace management which allows a lot of freedom at low density, but little freedom at high density.