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posted by martyb on Wednesday March 29 2017, @10:44PM   Printer-friendly
from the we'll-get-around-to-it-someday dept.

When it comes to airport infrastructure, the design of terminals may have changed over the years, but the long, straight runway has stayed remarkably consistent. Dutch researcher Henk Hesselink thinks it's time for a change. His radical ideas about runway design would transform the modern airport's operations, layout, and efficiency—and even its architecture.

Since 2012, Hesselink and his team at the National Aerospace Laboratory (NLR) in the Netherlands have been working on a runway design that's circular instead of straight. Their so-called Endless Runway Project—funded by the European Commission's Seventh Framework Program, which supported research in breakthrough technology from 2007 through 2013, and in partnership with several other European scientific agencies—proposes a circular design that would enable planes to take off in the direction most advantageous for them. Namely, the direction without any crosswinds.

https://www.fastcodesign.com/90107235/why-airport-runways-should-actually-be-circular

[Related]: giant circles from the air

Do you think such a design would work in practice?


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  • (Score: 4, Insightful) by Mykl on Wednesday March 29 2017, @10:58PM (13 children)

    by Mykl (1112) on Wednesday March 29 2017, @10:58PM (#486230)

    Often runways are aligned to flight paths, which are agreed with local governments/councils to accommodate noise pollution around populated areas. I assume that a circular runway that allows pilots to take off from any direction would throw all of that out of the window.

    I can imagine life as an Air Traffic Controller would also be really fun during those times of cross-wind. Suspect that, since most pilots are trained to handle moderate cross-wind, that it would be 'too hard' to break out a different set of angles.

    I get the idea of a banked curve to 'balance out' the side force of turning, though I would imagine that these could be incredibly hard to perform emergency landings on.

    Looks like you'll need to dig some pretty significant tunnels to get all of the airport traffic under the runways and terminals too.

    Based on all of this, I assume that this design is only intended for new airports, not 'upgrades' to existing ones?

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  • (Score: 2) by bob_super on Wednesday March 29 2017, @11:05PM (1 child)

    by bob_super (1357) on Wednesday March 29 2017, @11:05PM (#486234)

    > Air Traffic Controller would also be really fun during those times of cross-wind.

    Winds also shift direction fairly quickly. Are you gonna send dozens of planes around the airport twice?

    > which are agreed with local governments/councils to accommodate noise pollution around populated areas.

    "Those planes are back where they belong ... over the houses of poor people" - Homer Simpson
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mr._Spritz_Goes_to_Washington [wikipedia.org]

    • (Score: 2) by RamiK on Thursday March 30 2017, @12:07AM

      by RamiK (1813) on Thursday March 30 2017, @12:07AM (#486257)

      I just realized congressman Krusty is now president.

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      compiling...
  • (Score: 3, Interesting) by JoeMerchant on Wednesday March 29 2017, @11:06PM (9 children)

    by JoeMerchant (3937) on Wednesday March 29 2017, @11:06PM (#486236)

    Airport noise pollution controls are such utter B.S. - at least in Miami. The takeoff to the east directions say: "proceed to Biscayne Bay, then turn left" which works well for the passenger planes that make a gentle arc out over the (mostly unpopulated) bay and then begin their serious climbout. Meanwhile, the cargo pilots pull a high-G left, point their engines at Biscayne Boulevard and the surrounding homes, and utterly blast everything from 35th Street north to about 90th Street with a direct focused full throttle climbout.

    There's a website where you can report objectionably loud aircraft operations. In response, they send you a radar track of the plane you most likely complained about and tally your complaint in a monthly report. In other words, they know you're pissed, they know why, they show the aircraft and its ground track including altitude, clearly blasting the neighborhoods with jetwash so loud you can't scream to each other inside the house until it passes. Every couple of years they publish a summary report, make fun of the guy who reports every single plane that flies over his house, and ignore the 500 or so other people who took the time to register complaints.

    Nothing changes, meanwhile - the leaves of the plants in the yard occasionally get brown spots from jet fuel raining down from the leakers - you can tell because the "shadowed" leaves don't get the spots - the "spotting agent" is raining down vertically.

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    • (Score: 2) by subs on Thursday March 30 2017, @01:05PM (8 children)

      by subs (4485) on Thursday March 30 2017, @01:05PM (#486445)

      Airport noise pollution controls are such utter B.S.

      You may think so if you're the unfortunate guy on the receiving end of noise regulations, but let me tell you they are there for a very good reason, DO work and provide tangible noise benefits (as measured objectively using pretty sensitive equipment). That having been said, I've looked over Miami's airport charts and can't find a specific noise-sensitive departure notice, so most like the FAA deemed the standard noise-abatement departure profiles to be "good enough". Looking specifically at the easterly departure you describe, I suspect what you perceive as a "high-G left" is actually just a normal turn to the north on something like the HEDLY2 departure procedure [skyvector.com]. The procedure specifies that the aircraft is allowed to make turn anticipation and autopilots will do just that - turn early so that given the momentum and bank limits of the airplane, they establish themselves on the northerly track correctly without overshooting. Looking at the chart, I'd guess that they're going to be a good 2000-3000 feet off the ground by the time they start the turn and therefore will already have executed a thrust reduction.

      • (Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Thursday March 30 2017, @03:35PM (7 children)

        by JoeMerchant (3937) on Thursday March 30 2017, @03:35PM (#486516)

        What I noticed from the dozen or so "complaint responses" I received was that the really bad ones were all cargo planes, UPS, FedEx, smaller operators still identifiable as cargo. The majority of the planes do turn out over the bay and climb more gently, but the loud cargo planes are, according to their flight tracks, making sharper turns and climbing much faster.

        We moved from 75th street to 91st street, still under the flight path, and the reduction in noise was remarkable. At 75th street, the windows would rattle for 60 seconds or longer when a "bad" one went over, by 91st street the noise was barely noticeable inside the house. We had friends who lived down around 65th street and the noise there was incredibly worse, cover your ears to stop the pain if you are outside worse. There were several thousand houses affected by what I would call "unacceptable" levels of jet takeoff noise on that commonly used easterly departure, apparently that's not enough to trigger additional mitigation by the FAA.

        The sad thing is, if they would spend the extra jet fuel to fly a few miles further out before turning north, they'd be over the Atlantic Ocean and impact virtually noone - it's what they do in Oahu, you see the jets there, but never hear them - at least that's how they operated when I was in Waikiki.

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        • (Score: 2) by subs on Thursday March 30 2017, @04:09PM (5 children)

          by subs (4485) on Thursday March 30 2017, @04:09PM (#486553)

          apparently that's not enough to trigger additional mitigation by the FAA

          You can be certain that the FAA looked at everything that can be done, but unfortunately, to the east of Miami airport, it's all built up area, so there's only so much you can do. The reason why they'd take off in an easterly direction rather than westerly is because most seaside areas experience a see breeze, so wind blowing from sea onto land. Therefore, takeoffs towards the water are often preferred, simply for safety reasons.
          I don't know why the cargo aircraft were louder, considering they're likely departing lighter. My guess would be that it's because cargo airlines typically operate a much older (and therefore louder) fleet. Screamers such as the Boeing 727, DC-10 and Airbus A300 are practically gone from passenger service (due to them being uneconomical), but they're still being operated in huge quantities by FedEx and UPS. By comparison, more modern aircraft such as the Boeing 787, Airbus A380 and A350 are whisper quiet.

          • (Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Thursday March 30 2017, @08:17PM (4 children)

            by JoeMerchant (3937) on Thursday March 30 2017, @08:17PM (#486720)

            Having lived under the flightpath for 12 years, I can tell you these things:

            1) The cargo jets make a sharp left when they reach the bay, then they climb out hard and fast over the neighborhoods. By comparison, passenger jets make a slow arcing turn that puts their climbout over the water and they climb (on average) much more slowly.

            2) Yes, the cargo jets are running older, louder engines, but that's not the only difference.

            3) There's an amazing opportunity when departing eastward from MIA: the Atlantic Ocean, if you just continue straight down I-195 like the trans-atlantic routes do, you'll pass over a commercial zone on Miami Beach and then 'voila! you're over a zero population area - blast away as loud as you like. I understand that at 300 knots, this might add an additional 3 minutes travel time per flight and increase fuel costs for domestic (northward turning flights) by a stunning 0.5% or so. But, if you care so much for fuel consumption, why require travel to the bay in the first place? Just turn left immediately after takeoff.

            4) With the kind of data they have on ground-tracks, altitude tracks, model of the aircraft, etc. they can bloody accurately model the noise impact of every single flight, number of houses affected, time of day (night, and cargo especially at 5 f-ing AM) and start charging increased landing fees (higher than the fuel savings) to operators that are blasting the city unnecessarily. But they won't, because this has been going on for 40 years and there's no political will to serve the constituency.

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            • (Score: 2) by subs on Thursday March 30 2017, @08:48PM (3 children)

              by subs (4485) on Thursday March 30 2017, @08:48PM (#486739)

              Having lived under the flightpath for 12 years, I can tell you these things:

              Unfortunately, without hard stats it's difficult to estimate how accurate your personal perception is. From what I can see on flightaware.com [flightaware.com], clicking through the previous 30 flights, including some cargo flights, all using the HEDLY2 departure procedure, they all seemed to initiate their turns pretty much only over the water and follow the assigned departure track pretty closely.

              There's an amazing opportunity when departing eastward from MIA: the Atlantic Ocean

              And in fact, that's what they do. Here's [skyvector.com] a pretty common procedure used when flying towards JFK and it takes you out about 2 miles offshore before turning you to the northeast.

              Just turn left immediately after takeoff

              A turning airplane climbs slower, so it actually impacts MORE people with noise. The majority of the noise is actually behind the aircraft, so if you keep its butt orientated towards the airport until it at least clears 2000-3000 feet, then you will have impacted people less than turning immediately over their heads and pointing your engines straight at them at low altitude and full power.

              But they won't, because this has been going on for 40 years and there's no political will to serve the constituency.

              All of what you proposed has already been done. The FAA isn't a bunch of idiots you know. They've already done the environmental modeling, extra fee charging (yes, night ops ARE more expensive!) and much more that you can't even imagine exists. Just consider that what you're saying, they've already considered and mitigated as best they can. Sadly, at the end of the day, even the FAA can't break the laws of physics.

              • (Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Friday March 31 2017, @03:51AM (2 children)

                by JoeMerchant (3937) on Friday March 31 2017, @03:51AM (#486916)

                I lived in that neighborhood from 1992 through 2003, it was annually reported on in the Miami Herald for years before that and NOTHING happened. The neighborhood was "gentryfying" in the early 2000s, maybe by now they've got enough capable lawyers in there to actually get something done. Dozens of ordinary residents reporting the problems to the "proper channels" got nowhere.

                Subjective has nothing to do with windows rattling and sound levels on the street that you are physically incapable of screaming over - I don't care what your dB meter calls acceptable, that's just too damn loud, and it went on for the entire time I lived there. The people who live just north of MIA in the south end of Miami Springs, well, there, you should expect the noise, and they had plenty of it, noise and fumes too - but when you live over 8 miles away from the airport, at a diagonal off the end of the runway, you don't expect to be targeted by the back end of 727s for their whole climbout - the long noise events would do just that, point the engines straight at the neighborhood and keep them there for well over a minute as they climbed out. Not saying we were intentionally targeted, just saying that's what they did and it has the same effect.

                The thing was, wind patterns vary and what I would call NAP violators would happen a few times, then not be heard for days, then they'd be back again. One particular jackass I remember piloted the 5am run for UPS, woke me up 3 days running (I normally slept in until 7, but this was loud enough to wake me from a deep sleep) - reported via e-mail, got the tracks sent to me a month later when they got around to reading the backlog of e-mails, and maybe somebody had words with him, or maybe the winds shifted and they started going to the west for awhile... anyway, the 5am thing stopped for a couple of months, then it came back again for a few days, off and on for YEARS. It's like they were issuing speeding tickets with no fines or points attached, and the noise problem jets just kept coming over and over and over.

                MIA supports dozens of takeoffs per hour, and most of them were not a problem, but there were enough to significantly impact quality of life where I lived, and there were people down around 65th street who sold out specifically because of it. As you say, once they got a little more altitude (by 91st st) you could barely hear them, ever.

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                • (Score: 2) by subs on Friday March 31 2017, @10:11AM (1 child)

                  by subs (4485) on Friday March 31 2017, @10:11AM (#487015)

                  Well, as I said, most likely nothing could be done. You were just the unfortunate casualty of noise regulations (i.e. the limited group who couldn't be sorted to their satisfaction) - those regs are very much "the needs of the many over the needs of the few". Also, from 1992 - 2003 and from 2003 - today would be a HUGE difference in noise profile, simply because aircraft got A LOT quieter. Again, there's only so much the FAA can do and I'm reasonably convinced that given the circumstances, they did as much as they could. The only remaining (and extremely expensive) alternative would have been to move the airport far away. Given southern Florida's geography, it wouldn't surprise me if this would result in a 2-3 hour drive to & from the airport, which can significantly decrease tourism and cause a rapid decline in local economy.

                  • (Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Friday March 31 2017, @06:59PM

                    by JoeMerchant (3937) on Friday March 31 2017, @06:59PM (#487243)

                    Well, as I said, there's water nearby, about 1000 feet from my house, and there is absolutely no reason to impact a neighborhood of 1000+ homes when you could just as easily turn 10 seconds later and impact the surface of the water instead. Absolutely they could have done something about it, our neighborhood of 1000+ homes was just the unfortunate casualty of a bureaucracy that doesn't care to prioritize residents' quality of life over the bother of enforcement of the regulations they already have in place.

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        • (Score: 2) by subs on Thursday March 30 2017, @04:22PM

          by subs (4485) on Thursday March 30 2017, @04:22PM (#486566)

          The sad thing is, if they would spend the extra jet fuel to fly a few miles further out before turning north, they'd be over the Atlantic Ocean and impact virtually noone - it's what they do in Oahu, you see the jets there, but never hear them - at least that's how they operated when I was in Waikiki.

          Most of the noise footprint is when the aircraft is closest to the ground. As the aircraft climb, the noise rapidly decreases. The reason why they don't turn later is probably because they deemed the attained altitude to be sufficient. It's likely a later turn would provide essentially no benefit to the most affected areas (i.e. right under the flight path). The reason why you probably didn't hear much from Waikiki is because most departures from Honolulu contain an early turn right after takeoff. This is turn is typically initiated at around 400-600 feet above ground and they turn direct south to avoid most of the city. The departure charts [skyvector.com] even contain an explicit instruction about this:

          NOTE:Honolulu departures from Rwys4L/R and 8L/R must complete right turn to assigned heading within 2NM of departure end of runway (HNL 3.6 DME)

          2 nautical miles puts them around Sand Island and about 2-3 statute miles from Waikiki. Considering you're seeing them side on and that far away, it's no wonder you wouldn't be able to hear them at Waikiki.

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 30 2017, @12:13AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 30 2017, @12:13AM (#486260)

    No, runways are laid out based on the prevailing winds in the area.