Air Transport System

In this section, you will learn more about the air transport system. You will get to know the activities that drive this system and the goods that are transported by air transport. You will then be introduced to the airplanes used for transportation. In addition, the infrastructure of the air corridors and its airport facilities will be explained. Finally, the advantages and disadvantages of air transport will be highlighted.

On this page, the element "Activities" will be presented to you.

• Each such activity creates the demand to ensure accession to the facility where the activity is scheduled to take place.
• This creates the demand for offering transport options
• When the transport option is realised, traffic is generated.
• Thus all demand is a derived demand, which are all generated by the planning and execution of human activities. 
• So we as consumers drive the system, while the order is the steering medium.

Different kind of goods can be transported by air, which will be presented to you on this page. 

• emergency shipments
• perishable goods (goods with a physically limited shelf life, goods with a rapid loss of value due to market conditions, e.g. clothing)
• goods with a high value-to-weight ratio (electrotechnical, precision mechanical, pharmaceutical and optical products, e.g. computer processors, PCs, cell phones, tools, medicines, cameras, etc., as well as art and other valuables)

 

The following pictures are showing different kinds of air traffic containers. As you can see, the shapes of the containers are adapted to the shape of the airplanes. Containers for the lower deck are having a flattened side and corner, so that they fit better to the round shape of the airplane. Containers for the middle deck don‘t always need to have this adapted shape, but for the containers at the edge, a lot of times the upper corner is flattened as well.

Transport

 

 

More than half of the total air freight volume is distributed among 15 cargo hubs worldwide like Memphis, Hongkong, Tokio, Frankfurt, Shanghai, Singapore and Paris. In Germany, the air freight is concentrated in Frankfurt and Leipzig/Halle (=73 % of the total air freight volume). 92 % of the total air freight volume is handled in Frankfurt, Leipzig/Halle and Köln/Bonn.

Feel free to check your knowledge with the following questions.

On this page, the movables of the air transport system model are presented to you. In terms of air transport, those movables are the "Airplanes". 

Different types of aircraft are used for air freight transportation, depending on the quantity of goods to be transported and the transport distance.

• A350F
• A321P2F
• A330-200F
• A330-P2F
• BelugaST
• BelugaXL

• Boeing 777F

• Boeing MD-11

• Antonow AN-225

Traffic

 

• preventing collisions: - between aircraft, and - in the maneuvering area between aircraft and obstructions.
• expediting and maintaining an orderly flow of air traffic.

• the maximum utilization of existing capacities must be ensured and
• congestion situations in individual traffic areas must be avoided by regulating traffic.

You can test yourself with the following questions:

This page will deal with the element „Infrastructure“ of the conceptual system model of transport and traffic.

In case of the air transport system, air corridors are the underlying infrastructure that is used to transport goods from A to B.

• prevent collisions between aircraft;
• prevent collisions between aircraft on the maneuvering area and obstructions on that area; note that this objective does not include the apron and ANS in general is not intended to prevent collision with terrain.
• expedite and maintain an orderly flow of air traffic;
• provide advice and information useful for the safe and efficient conduct of flights;
• notify appropriate organizations regarding aircraft in need of search and rescue aid, and assist such organizations as required.

Land use

Feel free to check you knowledge on air corridors by answering the following question.

On this page, you will learn more about the element facilities. In the air transport system, the facilities are called "Airports".

• Route safety function; which includes ensuring safe take-offs and landings, as well as safeguarding the flow of traffic on the airfields.
• Clearance function; which includes the operational handling of aircrafts as well as the handling of the cargo (passengers, freight or mail).
• Support function; which are focused on the ancillary tasks associated with air traffic. This includes general auxiliary tasks, such as maintenance tasks, as well as special auxiliary tasks that generally serve to satisfy the needs of airline customers and airport visitors.

Literature

In order to sum up the topic „Air Transport System“, we will present you some advantages and disadvantages of the air transport system.

Advantages

• high transport speed
• no need for packaging enduring see transportation
• high safety standards and low transport risks
• overall logistics concept is less susceptible to disruptions than that of other freight methods
• high degree of punctuality

• high transportation costs
• high energy consumption
• transport of dangerous goods usually excluded

By choosing the intermodal Sea-Air-Transport, the CO2 emissions and transport costs can be reduced (compared to air freight only) while also the transport time can be reduced (compared to sea transport only).

Literature

You can check your knowledge about air transport with the following quiz.

Airbus (2021): A319ceo. URL: https://aircraft.airbus.com/en/aircraft/a320/a319ceo  (last access: 30.03.2022).