ACRP IdeaHub Ideas

Objective is to develop airport-specific design guidelines and best practices for airport terminals and passenger facilities to make them accessible to all persons.

Review the tools and practices currently being used to conduct airfield pavement conditions.

Further guidance on how to approach the design of airport infrastructure that is more resilient to climatic change is required. Efforts are underway both nationally and internationally to address identification of vulnerabilities and incorporating into planning documents; but there remains a gap in procedures to evaluate and determine design criteria for engineers and architects that may be more readily endorsed by funding... more »

Airports are increasingly interested in bringing multi-disciplines together in a common environment to improve collaborative decision making during regular and irregular operations. Guidance on how to plan and design for these centers is needed.

The USGS will be releasing the Earthquake Early Warning System for public use in 2018. All airports in the west will need to understand how this will directly impact shutdown of critical infrastructure, alerting to the public and changes in the airport safety systems.

How can airports set up incubators unit to create a space for innovators to solve airport problems based on challenges placed on them from different departments? Then, using the resulting solution, partner (in terms of equity) with the innovators. Help them form companies that the airport can partner with. Then market to other airports.

This research would examine several examples where implementation of Metroplex or other procedures has resulted in widespread increased community complaints and would explore options for redesigning those flight tracks to reduce noise concentrations over noise sensitive areas while satisfying project design goals and constraints. Changes in aircraft noise exposure, fuel consumption, and air emissions would be quantified... more »

To determine best practices for providing backup transportation within an airport for the following situations:

- Aircraft emergencies, where passengers must deplane an aircraft and be bused to a terminal

- Planned and unplanned outages of alternative intra-airport transportation systems such as trains.

Develop a simplified airport emissions inventory tool for criteria pollutants.

Demonstrate an autonomous system that meets flight requirements for

small airports and commercial operators.

The objective of this research is to create a database of performance benchmarks for airport facilities. Airport staff need a better understanding of key operational metrics associated with building performance in order to improve efficiency, decrease operating costs, and reduce environmental impacts. A standard system which normalizes for weather, location, carbon intensity of utility supplied energy, and airport specific... more »

Establish if and how recycled (pyrolyzed) carbon fibers can be used in place of virgin carbon fibers for achieving comparable performance at lower material costs.

Guidance on holisitic master planning that goes beyond just future

facility and infrastructure that includes the sub categories such as IT,

Operations, Security and Maintenance as examples. It would also provide guidance on how to develop a "plan" for the ancillary operating areas and how important components may be rolled into a true master plan

Airports make a lot of investments in community/social/environmental causes, but how does an airport measure the investment to see if it's having an impact? Could it be a trust index or another measurement tool.

Conduct research to update the state-of-the-science regarding the feasibility of reducing or eliminating noise in communities from aircraft departures, specifically behind the start of takeoff roll, with active noise reduction technology.