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(2017)ThesisAirline passenger segmentation is traditionally classified into the categories of Business, Leisure and VFR (visiting friends and relatives). Most academic studies to date have only focused on the differences between business and leisure passengers without further exploring potential segments among business passengers. Hence, this research aims to enhance our understanding of the flight choice behaviour of business passengers, and in particular, exploring the potential differences between those who work in small and medium enterprises (SMEs, with 200 or less staff) and those in non-SMEs (more than 200 staff). Descriptive analysis from revealed preference (RP) data and discrete choice models from stated preference (SP) choice surveys are used to ascertain attributes that are significant to choice behaviour. Descriptive analyses show that more business passengers work in the SME category. However, SME passengers tend to fly less, are more price-sensitive, and derive less satisfaction in flying with full-service carriers if they have previously flown with low-cost carriers. Discrete choice model results show that fewer flight service attributes are significant on flights between Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane due to shorter flight duration. However, more attributes related to ticket flexibility are found significant for one-day trips. On flights between Perth and the east coast, willingness to pay calculates a range of $25 to $62 for one piece of checked baggage, and $30 to $46 for an extra legroom seat. Attributes related to flight comfort have a larger significance on inbound flights (i.e., return flights from Perth to the east coast). Self-funded passengers are more price-sensitive when purchasing flights. Furthermore, we observed in choice experiment that attribute non-attendance (ANA) is above 55% for all tested attributes, with the exception of fare; not all attributes are perceived equally by business passengers. Flight product attributes are considered separately from ticket flexibility attributes by business passengers. Therefore, airlines may consider unbundling its products for them. New SP surveys can be deployed to test future flight products. The traditional segmentation method of passengers based on Business, Leisure and VFR trip purposes should be thoroughly reviewed, with the categorisation of business passengers expanded based on the findings of this research.
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(2012)ThesisMany airports around the world have co-located or are in the process of reallocating alliance aligned carriers to their designated terminals or terminal areas, to promote flight connectivity, common user facilities and airport-airlines relationships. While operational and financial benefits on the part of the airlines have been made clear by existing literatures on airline alliances and alliance-hubbing, but the tangible benefits to be derived by airport operators are less obvious. In order to better understand why airport operators have come onboard with the concept in the first place, this paper considered existing cases of London Heathrow, Paris Charles de Gaulle and Tokyo Narita Airport. These airports were selected for the qualitative case analysis primarily because of the relevance of their operating environment (i.e. alliance network hubs) and their early implementation of alliance terminal co-location. A quantitative case study on Sydney Airport – representing airports without the implementation of the concept, was conducted to determine if alliance terminal co-location could yield operational and financial merits for the airport operator similar to those observed at the sample airports.
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(2015)ThesisMost aircraft maintenance optimisation models have been developed within the context of heavy maintenance visits, overhaul centres, aircraft routing and assignment. While a great deal of work has been carried out in flight scheduling, crew scheduling and passenger-mix optimisation, a limited number of optimisation models have been developed within the context of the line maintenance environment. Aircraft line maintenance is any maintenance that is carried out before flight to ensure that the aircraft is fit for the intended flight. Task yield is measured by the actual interval when a maintenance task is scheduled compared to the maximum allowable interval expressed as a percentage. Due to a lack of appropriate optimisation techniques, the traditional manual scheduling process typically generates an aircraft line maintenance schedule with the limited assistance of computer systems. Exact optimisation techniques offer solutions to some problems, but often lead to unacceptable execution time as the size and complexity increase. The heterogeneity of aircraft fleets, cyclic nature of maintenance jobs, multiple maintenance sites, dynamically variable resources and continual variation of schedule operation make aircraft line maintenance scheduling more difficult than production scheduling, flight scheduling and crew scheduling. In this thesis a heuristic technique with a hybrid combination of classical job scheduling methods was chosen and a Line Planning Optimisation (LPO) algorithm was developed to deal effectively with the combinatorial nature of the problem in order to solve the feasibility problem and maximise task yield. The optimised schedule gained 43% task yield compared to the traditional manual schedule with the test case. The LPO algorithm offered excellent feasibility with a much faster execution speed of 45 seconds compared to 35 minutes with the manual process. The algorithm was implemented for a range of 64 cases with different job due time buffers and achieved further optimisation with 64% task yield compared to 43% task yield of the benchmark case. The sensitivity analysis showed that the LPO algorithm was more sensitive to the Early Cycles , Early Days and Late Hours components of the total job spread.
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(2022)ThesisEmerging modes of air transport such as autonomous airport shuttle and air taxi are potentially efficient alternatives to current transport practices such as bus and train. This thesis examines bus shuttle service within an airport and air metro as two examples of network design. Within an airport, the bus shuttle serves passengers between the terminals, train stations, parking lots, hotels, and shopping areas. Air metro is a type of pre-planned service in urban air mobility that accommodates passengers for intra- or inter-city trips. The problems are to optimise the service, and the outputs including the optimal fleet size, dispatch pattern and schedule. Based on the proposed time-space networks, the service network design problems are formulated as mixed integer linear programs. The heterogeneous multi-type bus fleet case and stochastic demand case are extended for the airport shuttle case, while a rolling horizon optimisation is adopted for the air metro case. In the autonomous airport inter-terminal bus shuttle case, a Monte Carlo simulation-based approach is proposed to solve the case with demand stochasticity, which is then further embedded into an "effective" passenger demand framework. The "effective" demand is the summation of mean demand value and a safety margin. By comparing the proposed airport shuttle service to the current one, it is found that the proposed service can save approximately 27% of the total system cost. The results for stochastic problem suggest estimating the safety margin to be 0.3675 times of the standard deviation brings the best performance. For the second case, the service network design is extended with a pilot scheduling layer and simulation is undertaken to compare the autonomous (pilot-less) and piloted service design. The results suggest that an autonomous air metro service would be preferable if the price of an autonomous aircraft is less than 1.6 times the price of a human-driven one. The results for rolling horizon optimisation suggest to confirm the actual demand at least 45 minutes prior to departure. Based on data from the Sydney (Australia) region, the thesis provides information directly relevant for the service network design of emerging modes of air transport in the city.
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(2019)ThesisAlthough cargo airships could potentially provide greater efficiency and flexibility in freight transportation and reduce demand on infrastructure, currently they remain a theoretical concept. This research aims to examine the factors determining the demand for their services from the perspective of transport logistics professionals. Specifically, the research examines the effects of freight type and freight modal attributes on freight mode choice decisions. As cargo airships is currently a hypothetical mode, an online freight mode choice experiment is conducted and the results analysed using a multinominal logit choice model. This analysis is explored further with the inclusion of qualitative data gathered through follow-up semi-structured interviews. The results of the online freight mode choice experiment established the potential demand for the cargo airship mode to be up to 27% of market share. The factor that provides the greatest variation in the choice model results is the different freight types, which include perishables, non perishables, oversize overmass (OSOM), and high value time sensitive (HVTS). Across these freight types the sensitivity of the modes (road, rail, sea and airship) to the variable attributes (price, time, reliability and frequency) varied substantially. Additionally, the willingness to pay (WTP) for the cargo airship mode for travel time saved is estimated to be $23.15 per tonne per hour. Simulations are further conducted from the choice model results to ascertain the potential market share of various different model cargo airships, including the exemplar model (ML868) by adjusting their speed (time) and cost (price) to reflect their predicted actual attribute levels. From these simulations it is established that there is potential demand in the Australian domestic freight market with the LMH-1 having the lowest market share of 7.56% and the ARH50 having the highest market share of 24.90%.
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(2020)ThesisThere is a large gap between the level of safety in high capacity Regular Public Transport operations and those in the General Aviation (GA) and training sectors of the aviation industry. One of the reasons for this gap is a lower ability of General Aviation to afford the monitoring equipment of other sectors. The increasing availability of Video, Audio and Flight Data Recording (VAFDR) equipment is an opportunity for operators and researchers to better understand safe flying performance in ab-initio and GA pilots. However, the sheer number of metrics and amount of data available from FDM can make it a challenge to use the data produced. Accordingly, this project aimed to: 1. Determine what the indicators and metrics are for safe flying performance of ab-initio pilots. 2. Identify a framework for the application of the metrics. 3. Identify the best metrics of safe pilot performance. 4. Determine which metrics Video, Audio and FDR, equipment can provide. To achieve these aims the metrics required were formulated and categorised into the Taxonomy of Safe Aviator Metrics (TSAM) which uses an excel spreadsheet in conjunction with a Metric and Variable Dictionary designed for use with a Garmin 1000 GNSS/FDR and an Appareo Vision 1000 video, VAFDR equipment. The TSAM was developed using the Australian CASA flight training syllabus, and consists of Domains, Units of Competency, Elements, Performance Criteria and Metrics Following development of the TSAM, the structure of the TSAM was validated by SMEs drawn from Australian CASA Approved Testing Officers using a Delphi technique. Broadly the structure of the TSAM was endorsed by the SMEs. SA was suggested for inclusion as well as a range of factors that are difficult to measure such as “Self-Management”. SMEs were also asked to identify the most critical element for measuring the safe performance of a pilot. While all elements were important to safety, the element of “maintain straight and level flight” was nominated as the most critical to safety. It was found that it is possible to measure the performance of pilots in relation to the critical UOC using this equipment but with some limitations. With some modifications to the equipment and the addition of other recommended equipment these limitations will be reduced. In addition to this, new equipment in this field as it develops will make this sort of research more feasible.
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(2016)ThesisRank-size relationships governed by the power law have been widely observed and studied in various domains including biology, physics, computer science, economics and other social sciences. In the tourism literature, power law has been invoked in the study of the geographic distribution of visitors and tourism. Although the law provides an excellent and simple guide in relating the abundance and size of tourism destinations, to-date, an important limitation in the studies of power law in tourism has been the lack of an explainable mechanism for the emergence of the power law pattern. In this context, the first aim of this thesis is to empirically examine the applicability of power law in explaining the rank-size relationship in the geographic distribution of visitors. The second aim is to investigate the potential mechanisms underlying the distributions by adopting a deductive approach, which is contrary to most previous investigations in tourism. Deriving from an assumption of herd behaviour for visitors, the Polya urn process for Visitor Distribution (PVD) model presented in this thesis yields a “power law-like” pattern at the macro level. The PVD model can serve as an analytical link between micro-level choice behaviours of visitors to the macro-level distributions, such that the complex network of visitor distribution may be associated with the individual’s choice behaviours. The PVD model has an advantage that it generates conveniently interpretable parameters for visitor distributions. Using data on international visitors’ geographic distribution in Australia, this thesis obtains evidence supporting the PVD 2 model as one of the potential mechanisms underlying power law or similar distributions in tourism. Two tourist characteristics - holiday visitors and visitors from Asian countries, were found to fit the PVD model particularly well. An additional finding indicates the potential existence of homogenous destination groups. The emergence of destination groups in the macroscopic tourism distribution may be attributed to the hierarchical destination choice behaviour of tourists. One of the important conclusions is that the choice behaviour and the geographic distribution of visitors are tightly related, and this link may offer insights into why power law-type distributions emerge in social systems.
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(2015)ThesisThe airline industry comprises a range of stakeholders including governments, industry organizations, local carriers, shareholders, and competitors seeking to access bilateral traffic rights between countries. The airline industry is required to work under a regulatory framework crafted sixty years ago to force all airlines to operate under the same international rules. These rules simultaneously aimed to maximize safety while restricting competition. Suppliers of aircraft, engines, reservation systems and airports are accessed by all competitors and provide airlines with little opportunity to achieve greater efficiency or competitive advantage. Despite this, each airline finds its place within the industry. The differences result from many factors including the economic freedom of their home country, their business model, nationality and ownership. Using mixed methods approach, a series of interviews with airline executives in Germany, Switzerland, Singapore, Thailand, Japan and Australia were positioned in Hofstede’s model of national cultures. Analysis of the interview transcripts using Hofstede’s keywords enabled the impact of national culture on airline decision-making to be studied. While airlines from small power-distance and individualist cultures are somewhat more likely to base decision-making on a broader involvement between employees and management, the overall finding of the interviews with airline executives is that Hofstede’s framework is not a strong predictor of airline executive behavior.