An Application of Simulation Approach for Estimating Sustainable Runway Capacity

Assessing runway capacity is essential for the effective planning of runway configurations, flight schedules, and traffic flows. Although various factors impact runway capacity, previous research has not quantitatively modeled the factors using simulation. This study develops a Discrete Event Simulation (DES) model to measure
runway performance and analyze its future capacity expansion. The model was tested at Penang Airport with a single runway. Using the DES model, three scenarios were considered: increasing the interarrival rate by 20%, decreasing it by 20%, and setting a mean of interarrival rate by 10 minutes. The impact of the scenarios on the average waiting time and the total number of aircraft completing the cycle (landing and takeoff) were then analyzed. The result showed that the second scenario produced the best performance in terms of the average waiting time and the cycle time. The research
provides insight for runway operators to optimize air traffic flow management and enhance runway capacity.