GRA has been involved in examining how air traffic management services are provided worldwide. The firm has supported major air traffic initiatives for FAA, and also conducted the first study of a single air traffic system in Western Europe for the Association of European Airlines, which led to the SESAR initiative.
Other air traffic management engagements include:
- Comprehensive analysis of shifting the provision of FAA air traffic control services to a government corporation or other independent entity. GRA assisted an inter-agency Executive Oversight Committee and supported task forces in budget and finance, governance, personnel and procurement.
- Decades of cost allocation and reauthorization support for FAA, including model development and data management to analyze the impacts of potential changes to the FAA’s financing and governance structure
- Support of the FAA Air Traffic Organization (ATO) in developing metrics, reporting and automation to analyze the efficiency of the U.S. National Airspace System (NAS). The work has included benchmarking U.S. NAS performance versus that of international air traffic systems.
- FAA New York City airports slot auction design
- Analysis of causes of airline delays and cancellations
- Airspace studies and business case development for air traffic management service providers in Bermuda, Bahamas, Indonesia, and Panama
- Economic analysis of the benefits and costs associated with adding or removing certain surveillance and navigation systems
To support much of the work noted above, GRA developed and maintains the FAA’s integrated ATO activity measurement and cost analysis system, the Air Traffic Services Business Model (ATSBM). The model tracks all costs and activity at the air traffic service delivery point level (i.e., individual towers and centers); it also estimates the costs of maintaining individual NAS facilities, such as radar, communications, and navigation and landing systems.
GRA also provides analytical and technical support to the ATO Technical Operations Data Management Team, which generates daily reports on operational status of FAA equipment, systems and services.