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Air Navigation and Weather Services

Taipei FIR CNS/ATM
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• Foreword
• Plan Goal and Schedule
• CNS/ATM System Program Office (SPO)
• Plan Consultant
• Implementation Plan Contents
• Communication
• Navigation
• Surveillance
• ATM
• CNS/ATM Implementation Plan Progress Status
• Quarterly International CNS/ATM Development Status
• Vocabulary in CNS/ATM
• Vocabulary in Aeronautics
• Links

ATM

1.  Organizational Consolidation

Considerations for Organizational Consolidation:

a.  The ASN will promote island-wide large scale communication capability and system

integration among ATC facilities.

b.  The current ATCAS has been utilizing multi-radar tracking for terminal and en-route

airspaces. Multi-radar tracking consolidates data received from different radar sensors to present one fused picture. The surveillance capability in terminal airspace is therefore not restricted by airport surveillance radar with maximum range of 60 NM.

c.  The ATMAS system core servers will service all ATC units, including the en route

    sectors, approach sectors, and towers. This reduces the need for more distributed ATC

    facilities, and suggests consolidation of non-tower ATC units.

d.  Office space to support consolidation of ATC units is planned for and provided, with

     the construction of the new North and South ATS Parks.

e.  The High-Speed Rail System became operational on 5 January 2007. The high speed

     train from Taipei to Kaohsiung takes approximately 90 minutes. Passenger load factors

     on domestic airlines are decreasing, which affects aerodrome operations, especially on

the West coast. The decreased aerodrome usage may translate into reduced infrastructure needs, both with regard to facilities and manpower.

f.   New air traffic operations between mainland China and four major airports in Taiwan

     has become a reality and has increase rapidly since President Ma took office in May

     2008. From July 2008 to June 2009, the traffics were 4,008 flights and carried about

     1,597,000 passengers. At the same time, air traffic between Hong Kong/Macao and

    Taiwan were decreased by 4.2% and 21.5%; the passengers volume decreased

    significantly by 8.7% and 24.0%. The second north and new south direct routes between

    Taiwan and China were opened late of July 2009, these will further increase traffic on

    direct flights and decrease between Honk Kong/Macao and Taiwan.

g.  The global economic crisis has resulted in a downturn in overall, Taiwan is heavily

     impacted by the crisis also. From July 2008 to June 2009, the traffics were decreased

     by 15.9%, the passengers were decreased by 12.1%, and cargos were decreased by

     23.8%. According to the figures shown by CAA, the trend of decrease, first half of this

      year was slow down a little bit than the second half of last year except air cargos.

2.  Airspace Restructuring

Restructuring Plan. The draft Plan was presented to the Air Navigation Regulatory Committee

for review and comments on 7 May 2004. The Airspace Restructuring Plan was approved by

the Committee on 2 April 2007.

radar coverage, communication coverage, communication networks, system

control/monitoring and maintenance, system security, and contingency planning.The

following is a summary of the Airspace Restructuring Plan:

　         The restructured en-route airspace contains six sectors: Straits Sector, North

Sector, West Sector, Central Sector, South Sector, and East Sector. To

accommodate future traffic growth, the current North Sector will split into two

sectors, and a new Central Sector will control the airspace below FL290. The

Kinmen, Taitung, and Hualien. The Taichung TMA will be split into North and

South sections, and the North section integrated into the North TCC at the North

ATS Park, the South section integrated into the South TCC at the South ATC

to provide better separation between SIDs and STARs for Taoyuan International

Aerodrome, and to provide separation with restricted areas.

3.  Construction of New ATS Parks

The CNS/ATM plan is designed to meet the forecasted growth in air transportation up to 2026 and to be compliant with ICAO standards. The original intent was to replace the current ATCAS that controls the West coast airspace, upgrade the capability of the East coast ATM systems, and then integrate these two systems into a single system. However, complications in integrating the two systems, and then operating three or more systems (including the North and South and the combined East-West systems), would have introduced significant additional uncertainty and risk. Therefore, the CAA carefully re-evaluated the options and decided to combine all of the ATC units into the North and South ATS Parks. The CAA canceled the East ATC Center building construction plan. The CAA will split the Hualien and Taitung TCCs and consolidate them into the North and South ATS Parks, respectively. The CAA has modified the airspace restructuring plan to reflect these changes.

The North and South ATS Parks will provide mutual back-up to each other in line with the contingency plan. This new organizational consolidation and airspace restructuring will promote the efficiency of air traffic management and system maintenance capabilities.

a.  Construction of the North ATS Park:

In order to meet the forecasted growth in air transportation, new ATM System and equipment are being installed and new buildings are being constructed to enhance the efficiencies of ATM and reduce the workload of necessary coordination among relevant organizations. In addition, plans are being finalized to adjust the airspace and consolidate ATS units. There are currently four ATC units in the west part of Taiwan: the TACC, the Taipei TCC, the Taichung TCC, and the Kaohsiung TCC. There are two ATC units on the East coast of Taiwan: the Hualien TCC and the Taitung TCC. All of these ATC units will be combined into either the new North or South ATS Park. The North ATS Park will house the following ATC units:

i.    Taipei ACC.

ii.   Taipei TCC.

iii.  Hualien TCC.

iv.  Taichung TCC (some sectors).

Based on the CAA’s evaluation of operational benefits and maintenance requirements, the CAA will also move several related ATS facilities and maintenance units into the North ATS Park. These other ATS facilities include: the Taipei Aeronautical Meteorological Center (TAMC), the Taipei Flight Information Center (TFIC), the Taipei Aeronautical Telecommunications Center (TATC), the Communication and Meteorological Section (CMS), and the Information Management Center (IMC).

The North ATS Park will contain a centralized monitoring and control system and a remote maintenance support capability that will serve all ATC units in the Park. The North ATS Park is located near the Taoyuan Air Cargo Park Free Trade Zone. This area is being promoted as the site of a new aviation city. The CAA has designed additional capacity into the site to ensure that future space requirements can be easily accommodated. The planning, design, and construction period was about three years for the North ATS Park, from September 2005 to July 2007. In reality, the completion date was March 2008 and CAA finished the final acceptance of the North ATS Park on July 2008. The North ATS Park is shown in Figure 1.

Figure 1. North ATS Park

In order to accommodate the ATMS equipment installation and to expand the operational space for the existing systems, the CAA is in the process of consolidating ATC units, restructuring airspaces, construction of North and South ATS Parks to effectively perform ATC service and reduce the coordination workload between ATC units. The South ATS Park will house Kaohsiung TCC, Taitung TCC and some sectors of the Taichung TCC.

The South ATS Park was planned to be built on the site near new Kaohsiung Tower, the site was owned by Taiwan Sugar Company [a state-run company supervised by the Ministry of Economics (MOE)]. However, the time required for the land acquisition would have taken longer than the time required for the CAA to comply with the ATMS installation schedule. After a site survey, the CAA has selected the nursery garden of the Kaohsiung International Aerodrome as the final site for the South ATS Park. To aid in the efficient maintenance of ATMS equipment and navigational aids, the South ATS Park will also combine the Kaohsiung Aviation Facility Sector, which is responsible for the maintenance of all navigational aids at aerodromes south of Chiayi City.

The planning, design, and construction period was about three years for the South ATS Park, from July 2005 to October 2007. In reality, the completion date was June 2008 and CAA finished the final acceptance of the South ATS Park on July 2008. The South ATS Park is shown in Figure 2.

Figure 2. South ATS Park

4.  Air Traffic Management System, ATMS

The CAA is implementing a next generation ATMS, in conjunction with an AISS and a DVCSS. The ATMS includes functions such as ATC, ATFM, ASM, and data link. The capabilities of the ATMS and the other two procured systems are described in the following sub-sections. The ATMS will be deployed on an open system architecture using COTS system components with minimal modification.

a.  Air Traffic Control, ATC:

The main functions of the ATMS are to assist controllers in establishing safe, orderly, and expeditious air traffic flow, accurately determine the position and intent of the aircraft, and alert the controller when there is a potential conflict.

(1) Flight environment data processing:

The ATMS will receive flight environment data from the AISS. The data include AIP data and updates, meteorological data, gun-firing data, and airspace closure data issued by NOTAM. All the information is stored and processed by the ATMS and displayed at the controller working position (CWP).

(2) Flight Data Processing, FDP:

The FDP function processes flight plans received from airlines and the military, from external FIRs, and from RPLs. An operator may make amendments to the flight plans through the Human-Machine Interface (HMI). The ATMS processes a flight’s flight plan data and the flight’s corresponding aircraft model characteristics to compute the flight’s four-dimensional route of flight, or “trajectory”. ATMS uses the meteorological data provided by the AISS in the calculation of trajectories. The FDP performs the following procedures:

i.    Confirms the status of the flight’s Diplomatic Clearance (DPL) and warns if the flight is

not cleared.

ii.   Validates the equipage of the aircraft, to determine if it satisfies the route operating

requirements.

iii.  Generates a four-dimensional trajectory that estimates the expected route of flight and

altitude and time profile.

iv.  Determines if and when the flight trajectory will penetrate gun-firing airspace or closed

airspace.

v.   Determines if the flight trajectory of an aircraft conflicts with other flight trajectories

vi.  Manages discrete beacon code

vii.  Associates the flight plan with the appropriate track and displays the association

symbol on the Air Situation Display (ASD).

The FDP monitors route conformance (lateral, longitudinal, and vertical/cleared-level) and generates an alert when a flight deviates from its planned route. The FDP also conducts partial processing and assignment of SSR codes and posts the data resulting from all of the above processes to the appropriate controllers.

(3) Surveillance Data Processing, SDP:

The SDP processes sensor data from short, medium and long range radars, from ADS-B and ADS-C systems, and Wide Area Multilateration (WAM) systems. The Eurocat SDP incorporates a Multi-Sensor Tracking System (MSTS) that uses Kalman filtration and likelihood algorithms to generate a single system track from all returns for each target. After processing the sensor data, the SDP produces a system track for the aircraft, displaying a “fused” aircraft position, an altitude, a speed, and velocity vector information on data blocks on the ASD. Controllers use this information as a primary source of data for providing separation services to aircraft.

(4) Safety Nets:

The ATMS compares each flight’s system track and expected trajectory generated by SDP and FDP, against other flights’ tracks and trajectories, and against terrain and special/danger areas. If a flight is expected to come into close proximity to another flight, or is flying too low based on the terrain, or is crossing or has crossed into a Special Use Airspace (SUA), the ATMS generates a “Safety Net Alert”.

Safety Net functions include Short Term Conflict Alert (STCA), Minimum Safe Altitude Warning (MSAW), and Airspace Proximity Warning (APW). These safety net functions provide timely warnings to controllers that allow them to advise the aircraft to take evasive actions to achieve safe separation from other aircraft, terrain obstacles, and restricted airspace.

The Mid-Term Conflict Detection (MTCD) function probes aircraft trajectories against other aircraft in the system and against Danger Areas and Special Use Airspaces (SUAs), but it probes a longer term in the future of the flight than the Safety Net Alerts. MTCD is therefore a more strategic guide to potential separation issues than the more tactical Safety Net Alerts. If MTCD detects a conflict situation, the system alerts the responsible controller well in advance of the problem. The controller can also use the conflict trial probe capability to test a proposed amendment to the flight plan. The proposed plan will be verified by the system, and if the system detects no new problems, the controller can issue a new clearance and the system will automatically amend the flight plan. The Flight Plan Conflict Function (FPCF) is the subsystem in MTCD that determines conflicts between two aircraft, while the Segregated Airspace Probe (SAP) subsystem determines conflicts between aircraft and airspace.

(5) Electronic Flight Strip, EFS:

EFSs are expected to save the controller considerable time, since any change in flight plan data will be automatically sent to successive controllers and the changed strip highlighted so that the controller can more easily identify the changes. Again, this type of automation gives controllers more time to concentrate on providing separation services. When a medium-term conflict or other alert is detected, the alert may also be shown on the EFS, assisting the controller to take action to correct the unsafe condition.

b.  Air Traffic Flow Management, ATFM:

The ATFM function monitors airspace and aerodrome capacity, and air traffic control workload (e.g. predicted demand on a sector, route, fix, or aerodrome). This information helps ATC facilities to strategically adjust the sectorization and staffing plan to various traffic situations. Tactically, ATFM supports sequencing to arrival aerodromes and fixes, and through sectors.

c.  Airspace Management:

ASM promotes the effective and efficient use of airspace to maximize capacity, increase safety, and provide operational and cost benefits to users. In the interest of improving airspace use, the CAA has begun using advanced procedures and rules such as RNAV, RVSM, and Required Navigation Performance (RNP), and will increase the use of such concepts in the future.

d.  Datalink Applications:

(1) ADS-B:

ADS-B transmits position and speed of aircraft to ATC units for surveillance and management when aircraft are within “radio line of sight”. The data transmission rate is adaptable, with a maximum rate of approximately once every second, compared to radar data rates of approximately once every 4 to 12 seconds. ADS-B can provide a more comprehensive surveillance of airspace, which leads to increased flight safety, and improves the provision of ATC separation service. Use of ADS-B in the cockpit equipped with a CDTI provides additional situational awareness to the pilot as well. The ATMS is capable of producing ADS-B position reports for those aircraft not equipped with ADS-B-Out to provide traffic information for transmission to aircraft through a ground-based Traffic Information Service - Broadcast (TIS-B) system, should the CAA choose to implement one in the future. Aircraft state information derived from on-board GPS receivers and related avionics can be transmitted to the ground station using 1090MHz Extended Squitter or a variety of other A/G data links, including potentially UAT and VDL Modes 4.

(2) ADS-C:

ADS-C is used primarily in an oceanic environment, and flights transiting Taipei FIR are rarely in oceanic sector control. Still, the new ATMS does include the capability to establish ADS-C contracts and send and receive ADS-C position reports and other messages via datalink, should the capability become necessary in the future.

(3) Controller-Pilot Data Link Communication, CPDLC:

The rapid growth of air transportation has increased radio communications requirements and has resulted in an increasingly congested radio frequency band. Furthermore, different accents and tones cause misunderstandings when using radio voice communication. ICAO has developed standardized ATC phraseology in the form of specific message sets for use in CPDLC. These allow the controller and pilot to communicate and exchange messages through digital data links, significantly reducing transmission errors and relieving controllers of common air-ground communications workload. The new ATMS system is capable of sending and receiving standard CPDLC messages for controller-pilot clearances and acknowledgments without the mistakes and distortion that may accompany voice contact.

(4) Pre-Departure Clearance, PDC and Departure Clearance, DCL:

Obtaining an early pre-departure clearance for departing flights is important to the airline operations office involved in the dispatch of aircraft. The new ATMS includes an infrastructure to supporting PDC for tower-initiated clearance and DCL for pilot-initiated clearance requests. The ATMS uses the data link connectins to transmit these clearances and their corresponding acknowledgments.

e.  Aeronautical Information Services System, AISS:

The new AISS system integrates the reception and distribution of static airspace data, such as AIP data, and dynamic airspace data, including weather data and NOTAMs. The AISS centralizes flight plan requests from airlines and other external sources, and distributes validated flight plans to the ATMS and other interested units within the Taipei FIR. The AISS provides Pre-flight Information Briefings at FIS terminals and over the internet that tailors the weather, airspace, and aerodrome information to the pilot-specified flight plan. The AISS also provides internet connectivity for airlines and other airspace users to track pre-flight flight plan data and RPLs, as well as entry and submission of RPLs and Post-Flight Reports. Finally, the AISS serves flight timing data to FIDS at Taipei FIR aerodromes over a secure internet connection.

From an ATC perspective, the AISS will be functionally integrated with the ATMS: the two systems will share information, processing, and displays. ATMS and AISS users can easily access the AISS information database via an intuitive, integrated interface. The AISS window actually appears on the controller’s auxiliary display as a separate window that provides ATC personnel with the ability to query and view weather, NOTAM, AIP, Diplomatic Clearance, and flight planning data. The AISS configuration is shown in Figure 3.

Figure 3. The AISS configuration

f.   Digital Voice Communication Switching System, DVCSS:

The redeployment of the ATC units and the restructuring of the airspace require a voice communication system that is significantly more interconnected and robust. Current digital voice technology provides significant increases in capacity and quality as well. The CAA has procured a new DVCSS to meet these needs and to anticipate future needs well into the life of the new systems. The new DVCSS will be connected to the existing VHF/UHF ground infrastructure to provide air-ground voice communications between the pilot and controller. Like the current voice switches, the new DVCSS will also provide ground-ground communications within ATC facilities and among various users from different ATC facilities.

Each DVCSS will have parallel running processors. The internal processing will be fully digitized and use Pulse-Code Modulation (PCM) and Time Division Multiplexing (TDM) structures for voice encoding and channel multiplexing.

5.  Relocation of ATS Units

To support the organizational consolidation plan, and the future commissioning of the North and South ATS Parks, the North ATS Park will accommodate the following facilities:

a.  Taipei ACC

b.  Taipei TCC

c.  Taichung TCC (some sectors)

d.  Hualien TCC

e.  Taipei Flight Information Center

f.   Information Management Center

g.  Taipei Aeronautical Telecommunication Center

h.  Taipei Meteorological Center

i.   Communication and Meteorological Equipment Sector.

The South ATS Park will accommodate the following facilities:

a.  Kaohsiung TCC

b.  Taichung TCC (some sectors)

c.  Taitung TCC

d.  Kaohsiung Aviation Facility Sector

The ATMS have been installed in the North and South ATS Parks and relevant towers. Most offices in Xiang-An Building and Kaohsiung TCC will be relocated to new ATS Parks. The relocation of ATS Units had been planned, but the actual moving schedule must be coordinated with building construction and the ATMS implementation plan.

Interior decoration of ATS Parks commenced in 2008: a working team was formed and was be on site to coordinate with contractors. Office automation and computer equipment will be procured in 2009 to ensure that parallel operation and transition can be carried out on schedule. Operational personnel will be deployed to the new ATS Parks in 2010 and 2011 to prepare for the commissioning of ATMS.

6.  Implementation of Independent Backup ATC System, IBAS

The current ATM systems are ATCAS for the West coast of Taiwan and EUROCAT for the East coast of Taiwan. To ensure that the basic ATC service can still be provided, the ATCAS is currently backed up by Micro-ARTS. IBAS was procured to replace the Micro-ARTS.

IBAS will remain as the backup system for ATMS when ATMS becomes the operational system in 2011. In high density airspace, IBAS will backup the ATMS during outages and provide basic RDP and FDP capabilities for sustaining ATC operations. IBAS processes flight plan and radar data, and displays radar targets and flight data lists to the ATC workstations. IBAS also produces paper flight strips. IBAS contingency includes a radar bypass mode that funnels radar sensor data directly to the ATC workstations. On 6 July 2005, Lockheed Martin was awarded the contract for the IBAS procurement, installation, and support. IBAS was operationally deployed on 15 June 2007.

Though the primary contingency plan for failure of a new ATMS systems in either the North or South ATS Park is for the other, still-functional ATMS system at the other Park to take over ATMS functions, IBAS will still provide basic ATC service in the event that the ATMS systems at both ATS Parks fail or can not handle full Taipei FIR ATC operations. The IBAS configuration is shown in Figure 4.

Figure 4. The IBAS configuration

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