City-ATM – Live Drone Demonstrations of new Concept Elements enabling Operations in Urban Areas

Abstract

In a future airspace management system for unmanned and manned airspace users - especially when enabling flights in urban areas - a large number of constraints and requirements must be considered in order to ensure a safe and efficient integration of new airspace users. These airspace users can be very diverse and include, in addition to VFR traffic, also other participants such as personal air vehicles, cargo UAS, parachute jumpers, weather balloons or prioritizing air traffic, e.g. rescue helicopters. In addition to aspects relating to different UAS/PAV design, performance and capabilities, further requirements for protecting flight areas (so-called geo-fencing) or board autonomous flights are to be considered in an urban ATM concept. In the City-ATM project, a concept for future air traffic management in urban airspace was developed, which enables safe and efficient integration of new airspace users. The concept includes the definition and validation of operational and technical concepts for airspace management, information provision, traffic flow and monitoring as well as defining a communication, navigation and surveillance infrastructure. Based on these concepts, a simulation and demonstration platform for urban ATM has been developed in City-ATM. From 2018 to 2021, the City-ATM project investigated new concept elements enabling drone flights in urban areas. City-ATM was a DLR funded project and was carried out in close collaboration with 6 external partners Auterion, DFS, FlyNex, KopterKraft, NXP, and ZAL. In total, three live demonstrations have been prepared and conducted, showing different aspects on how drones can be operated in urban areas in a safe and efficient way.