Human-centred design in air traffic control systems: a study on Arrival Manager (AMAN)

This work focuses on Air Traffic Management (ATM) solutions for increasing efficiency, safety, environmental sustainability, service quality and face the increasing demand for air transport. Particular attention is paid to the Arrival Manager (AMAN) system, a relatively new technology developed by the Single European Sky ATM Research (SESAR) and implemented in congested hubs all over Europe. Due to its low acceptability by air traffic controllers, its use is limited. After observing the operative environment, the main causes of the issue seem to be related to the Human-Machine Interface (HMI). For this reason, a human factors analysis of the HMIs is conducted. First, a simulator replicating the current AMAN system and logic is built as a reference framework. Then, a new solution interface is proposed and studied in its human factors aspects such as data accessibility, workload and situational awareness. The simulator is stable in different scenarios and provides reasonable results. The human factors analysis on the proposed interface, carried out involving operative air traffic controllers, highlights the need of establishing a communication, currently absent, between the radar interface and the AMAN HMI. In particular, the study underlines the need to provide the AMAN delay advice output in the aircraft label presented on the radar interface and to use a color gradient to represent the magnitude of the delay assigned by the system.