TORCH - Technical, economical and operational assessment of an ATM concept achievable from the year 2005
Overview
Background & policy context:
The current European Air Traffic Management (ATM) system is characterised by high fragmentation, a complex airspace structure and inhomogeneous levels of technical functionality. The resulting capacity and safety constraints contribute to significant delays and have a considerable impact on air travel as a whole. Long term R&D initiatives, such as Eurocontrol's EATMS concept or the ATM 2000+ strategy, target an operational ATM concept becoming fully active from the year 2015 on. To bridge the obvious gap in the implementation of advanced ATM systems and structures, the European Commission has initiated research on transitional solutions that could be implemented between 2005 and 2010, and that will be consistent with the long term strategy.
Objectives:
TORCH aimed to deliver a viable, consolidated operational concept for the year 2005, coherent and complementary to the ATM 2000+ strategy, by defining the CNS/ATM options for the concept through a set of scenarios. Technical, operational and economic assessments will use these scenarios to confirm the viability of the concept. (CNS - Communication, Navigation and Surveillance.)
The main objectives of TORCH have been:
- to define precisely the operational, technical and economic activities that are performed by the CNS/ATM system actors both in the air and on the ground;
- to assess the technological viability of the operational concept by
- identifying the technological sub-system requirements and transition steps,
- producing models and/or simulations of the technological products, and
- producing a technical assessment of the viability of the technological products;
- to assess the socio-economic and political viability of the operational concept by
- producing cost estimates of each CNS/ATM option of the operational concept,
- producing quantitative and qualitative benefit analysis estimates,
- producing a socio-economic assessment of the viability of best and worst case scenarios relative to the base case, and
- analysing the sensitivity of the socio-economic results to key parameters;
- to identify the critical elements of each scenario, both economic and political.
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