Role of Aviation in Seamless End-to-End Mobility

Abstract

As end consumers are becoming the source of information, providing their location, plans, and preferences, they are inviting services that tailor to their needs, on demand. Mobility is one such service that is witnessing transformation towards an end user orientation, aiming for a seamless journey, from end to end, that crosses the boundaries between modes of transportation and transaction. In this paper, we focus on the role of aviation in the inter-modal end-to-end journey. In particular, we focus on a key enabler - a system wide information management system (SWIM) that is key to sharing data between the different modes of transportation, their systems, stakeholders and users. We assess the role of aviation in inter-modal mobility in two respects: (1) Aviation as a segment in an inter-modal journey. Air transportation is inter-modal since, as aircraft carry passengers from gate to gate, other modes of transportation are necessary to complete the journey between the gates and the end points of the trip. We will discuss the impact of connectivity and end user orientation on this traditional air transportation model. (2) Aviation serving end-to-end markets. As most inter-modal efforts have focused on urban mobility, where multiple modes of transportation compete and complement each other, aviation remained largely foreign to this integration. This is likely to change with the advent of urban air mobility (UAM), which promises to compete with other modes of transportation in the urban environment. This transformation will require end-to-end, user-oriented air travel models, unlike the traditional gate-to-gate models. We will expand on extending SWIM adopted for aviation to other modes of mobility as a core enabler for real-time data sharing across modalities, networks, and seamless mobility. SWIM has been a successful Next Generation Air Transportation System (NextGen) technology for increasing information sharing among the stakeholders of the national airspace system (NAS). It enabled connecting the aircraft, the airline operators, and the service providers to increase collaborative and distributed decision making (CDM). Expanding such a technology to connect with and among the other modes of mobility and with passengers, will be key for enabling seamless mobility. “SWIM consists of standards, infrastructure, and governance that enable the management of air traffic management (ATM)-related information and how it is exchanged between users”. This is an important concept as we start to exchange data between the airlines and add new entrants into the NAS such as unmanned aerial systems (UAS) and UAM and share information with other transportation networks. For example, exchanging data with the airlines through SWIM collaborative decision making (CDM) enabled automated sequencing and scheduling of flights. Moreover, this platform has enabled creating better prediction algorithms and helps air traffic controllers manage workload. The paper will identify and discuss a Seamless Mobility Information architecture expanding on the SWIM capabilities and model which is a key for end to end mobility. In addition, it will propose an application in disruption management that can be developed and researched.