Areas of Investigation and Services

Operations Analysis and Performance Assessment

CNA Air Traffic Management is an integral part of the FAA's Performance Analysis Team in matters relating to National Airspace System (NAS) as well as in performance analyses of FAA programs and initiatives on the local, regional, and national levels – developing a comprehensive set of metrics to measure performance of the overall NAS, sectors, terminal areas, and airports.

CNA is the primary designer and implementer of the web-based Airspace Metrics System (AMS) used to determine controller and airspace performance, and used by FAA Finance to determine the financial allocations of facilities across the country. (Metrics include counts, cumulative distance and duration, and maximum and minimum densities – all computed at both facility and controller levels.

The ATM team supports the FAA’s office of Operations Planning and Business Planning & Development by evaluating the operational impact of decision-support tools (metrics here include flight efficiency, airport acceptance and arrival rates, delay, flight predictability, and airspace throughput), and assists several working groups focused on developing NextGen Air Traffic Policy (providing support in the areas of operations, security, and data collection/dissemination) ATM also provides real-time operational support of FAA crisis-management activities in response to national events such as hurricanes.

Under previous projects, ATM experts have evaluated the operational performance of the FAA's Safe Flight 21 initiatives, and studied the relationship between traffic management decisions and convective weather forecasts. ATM analyses have also been used at the FAA Command Center to make informed decisions during severe weather events.

Traffic Flow Analysis

CNA Air Traffic Management conducts analyses of the flow of air traffic to and from multiple airports to determine the impact on airport and airspace capacity, delays, and potential interference

In one study, CNA analysts were deployed to multiple Air Route Traffic Control Centers and to the Air Traffic Control System Command Center in Washington, DC where team members conducted several analyses, including: a predictive analysis of the potential effects on arrival and departure fix-loading of proposed changes to Continental Airlines’ schedule at Newark Airport; a study of arrival fix-balancing at Newark Airport; and a count by fix-of- all-traffic arriving at, or departing from, the DC-area’s three major airports.

CNA has also conducted an analysis of traffic-flow data for all flights into and out of Philadelphia over a busy two-day period – calculating arrival and departure rates, along with fix-loadings, and comparing them to Operationally Acceptable Level of Traffic values. Potential growth and the addition of a new runway were analyzed relative to fix-loadings. The analysis concluded that the arrival and departure fixes could handle increased traffic loads resulting from the projected growth.

Airspace Analysis and Design

CNA Air Traffic Management develops, maintains, and operates a comprehensive set of geographical analyses and modeling tools to support the FAA in determining the overall complexity and capacity of both high attitude and terminal airspace.

CNA ATM supports the parametric analysis project to help to determine the size and location of Air Defense Identification Zones and Flight Restricted Zones. Parametric analyses have become a critical capability in ensuring national security in post-9/11 America and are used by the FAA, the White House and the Departments of Homeland Security, and Defense to determine the impact of that ADIZ’s or FRZ’s will have on major public and private-use general aviation airports.

In other airspace analysis and design work, ATM analysts performed a study for the FAA’s Western Pacific Region to determine the feasibility of transforming California’s Brown Airfield to an air cargo facility; performed a study of the adherence to departure procedures out of Boston Logan International Airport; and worked in the FAA’s Great Lakes Region to determine the impact of creating a Military Operating Area (MOA) in the vicinity of Indianapolis, Covington, and Sandifer Airports (using SDAT – the Sector Design and Analysis Tool –– to view the traffic and the MOA in three dimensions and to make suggestions on how to adjust the MOA’s size to reduce or eliminate conflicts).

The ATM team also performed an analysis of Portland International Airport’s airspace to determine if a classification upgrade was warranted (it wasn’t), and conducted an analysis of Clinton-Sherman Airport as a potential site for a commercial spaceport.

Upper Airspace Management

CNA’s Air Traffic Management team works to improve the capacity, efficiency, and safety of upper airspace operations throughout the world and across multiple Flight Information Regions.

CNA is the principal analyst for the Safe African Skies Group, LTD and supported the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (a private-sector initiative to manage upper airspace in the sub-Saharan Africa), developing a feasibility study that considered:

  • Aligning current U.S. planning and implementation structures and processes with International Civic Aviation Organization processes
  • Airspace structure (supply) and traffic patterns (demand) and future growth predictions
  • Systems architectures – including communications, navigation, surveillance, and ground-based infrastructure
  • Legal and regulatory issues – including sovereignty, harmonization, and safety oversight
  • Financial and revenue analyses (to ensure financial viability)
  • And the impact on states and users – including air traffic management effectiveness.

Impact of Weather on Traffic Management Decisions

CNA Air Traffic Management applies its experience in operations analysis and event reconstruction to uncover trends in traffic management decisions as they relate to weather forecasts, helping Command Center traffic management specialists make more informed decisions during certain weather events.

As an example of this work: in 2002 CNA began a reconstruction and analysis project to assess the impact of convective weather on Command Center traffic management decisions.

The goal was to help Command Center traffic management specialists make more informed decisions during severe weather operations by allowing them to analyze past severe weather events. CNA analysts collected traffic data, along with predicted and actual weather data for several days during the 2002 thunderstorm season and built a parser to collect and combine original and amended flight plans for a given flight (for use in the reconstruction of flight plans in response to severe weather). CNA also worked with the Command Center’s chief meteorologist to develop a new way to use the Combined Convective Forecast Product to make it a more useful weather prediction tool.

Systems Management, Analysis, Architecture, and Requirements

CNA Air Traffic Management manages the development of several software tools for the FAA including the Sector Design and Analysis Tool (SDAT) – a tool to conduct real-world airspace analyses – developed by CNA under the sponsorship of the FAA. In addition to overall management of the SDAT program, CNA is also responsible for requirements development, architecture development, deployment, user training, and maintenance.

CNA supports the FAA Airport Surveying Geographical Information System Program (with responsibilities new requirements development, system testing, data standard development, and overall analytical program support) and has provided requirements and design analysis, information engineering, technical maintenance and project management support for a Notice to Airmen Automation desktop application called TFR Builder, which standardizes the construction, distribution and publication of Temporary Flight Restrictions.

CNA also leads System Wide Information Management’s (SWIM) efforts within the FAA’s Aeronautical Information Management (AIM) organization, to modernize how Special Use Airspaces and Air Traffic Controlled Assigned Airspaces are managed. And CNA works with AIM to improve its performance and efficiency through the use of Enterprise Architecture (a description of the current and planned structure and behavior of an organization’s processes, information systems, personnel, and organizational units). and has

In other work, CNA has provided systems engineering support to major FAA systems development projects including the Traffic Flow Management Modernization program, and provides program management, concept development, and systems engineering support for the global standardization of aeronautical information, working to develop the Aeronautical Information Exchange Model designed to support the global exchange of aeronautical information in a standard manner.

Modeling, Simulation, and Optimization

CNA’s ATM Team applies a variety of industry-accepted air traffic control models to solve clients' problems, and has developed custom simulation and optimization applications.

CNA supports the FAA's Office of Strategy and Performance Analysis (OSPA) through use of the NAS Strategy Simulator – a macro-level model that models every aspect of the National Airspace System, from delays to economics. (CNA’s work with the simulator includes debugging and output analysis, running the model and providing results to support FAA planning projects.) CNA also supports OSPA by creating detailed models of future air traffic demand, and leads efforts in the design, creation, and end use of the modeling for the detailed air traffic forecasts. (A current use of these forecasts is to predict, using a CNA generated trajectory modeler, the flight hours in the Air Route Traffic Control Centers in future years.)

Investment and Cost-Benefit Analyses

CNA Air Traffic Management conducts cost-benefit analyses for the FAA on ATC systems, procedures, and regulations, and supports the Traffic Management Advisor (TMA) tool in modeling airline and passenger cost savings for the TMA Program Office's responsibility to the Office of Management and Budget.

CNA also led the Controller Pilot Data Link Communications cost-benefit analysis – developing the analytical approach, helping estimate the impact of the technology at the sector and national levels, and performing economic analyses – and has supported the FAA's Business Planning and Development Team though economic analyses, and by providing input and assessment for the Joint Planning and Development Office, the inter-agency group created to plan the next generation air transport system.

Quality Management

CNA performs business process analyses and reengineering of the FAA’s Aeronautical Information Services Program to streamline and automate many of the manual, paper-based processes currently being performed. CNA is also leading efforts to implement a Quality Management System within Aeronautical Information Management (based on the ISO 9001:2000 series of standards).

Database Design, Operation, and Maintenance

CNA Air Traffic Management has been collecting and archiving data for the FAA since 1994. This experience has allowed our analysts to gain a thorough understanding of the quality of the FAA's various data sources – knowledge that is used to establish requirements for database designs, improve data quality, build databases that address the needs of the analytical community.

Aviation Safety Analyses

CNA has experience performing aviation safety analyses, including problems that relate directly to FAA air traffic management concerns. Specifically, we conducted safety and risk analyses on commercial aircraft separation procedures and operational errors.

Civil Aviation Security Analyses

CNA Air Traffic Management has supported the Science & Technology Directorate of the Department of Homeland Security through operations analyses of the Civil Aviation Security system, including data collection, data analysis, system modeling, gap analyses, and concepts of operations. These efforts produced a Research, Development, Test & Engineering plan, supported a pilot effort to model security architectures in a laboratory and airport environment, and developed a general deployment plan.

Acquisition Support

CNA supports the FAA’s Aeronautical Information Management (AIM) organization’s, acquisition activities by aiding the program manager in determining the scope of, and writing, validating, and submitting acquisition-related documents to ensure that AIM Modernization Segment 1 clears the FAA Acquisition Management System.