Impact Assessment of COVID-19 Measures on Airport Performance
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EUROCONTROL Impact assessment of COVID-19 measures on airport performance FOUNDING MEMBER NETWORK SUPPORTING EUROPEAN AVIATION MANAGER STUDY CARRIED OUT BY Airport Research Center GmbH (ARC) Edition number: 1.0 Edition validity date: 29/08/2020 IMPACT ASSESSMENT OF COVID-19 MEASURES ON AIRPORT PERFORMANCE DOCUMENT CHARACTERISTICS Document Title Edition Number Edition Validity Date IMPACT ASSESSMENT OF COVID-19 MEASURES 1.0 29/08/2020 ON AIRPORT PERFORMANCE Abstract Further to the EASA/ECDC guidelines for the management of air passengers in relation to the COVID-19 pandemic, EUROCONTROL commissioned an impact assessment of the COVID measures on airport performance. This work was performed by the Airport Research Center GmbH with the support of ACI EUROPE, IATA and four airports, Paris Charles-de-Gaulle, London Heathrow, Stuttgart and Swedavia airports. This document reports the major results and conclusions of this impact assessment. Author(s) Airport Research Center GmbH Contact Person(s) Tel/email Unit Bruno Desart [email protected] NMD/NOM/APT [email protected] Airport Research Center Uta Kohse [email protected] GmbH (ARC) 29/08/2020 Edition : 1.0 i IMPACT ASSESSMENT OF COVID-19 MEASURES ON AIRPORT PERFORMANCE Edition History The following table records the complete history of the successive editions of the present document. Contributors and Reviewers First Name Last Name Organisation First Eugene Leeman ACI-Europe Name Last Name Organisation François-Xavier Rivoisy ADP Olivier Delain ADP Marc Illing ARC Sebastian Barboff DFS Uta Kohse ARC Steven Moore EUROCONTROL Anastasiya Rybak ARC Bob Graham EUROCONTROL Andreas Zeiler ARC Alan Marsden EUROCONTROL Bruno Desart EUROCONTROL Vincent Treve EUROCONTROL Francisco Salguero EUROCONTROL Stefan Hilger FRAPORT Sergio Fernandez IATA Jennifer Sykes LHR Ana Gomez Pineda IATA Neil Pritchard LHR Joseph Chadwell LHR Fredrik Holgersson Swedavia Huneljot Grewal LHR Asim Umraz LHR Domenic Globisch STR Daniel Skoglund Swedavia Edition History This register includes the major milestones with external reviewers only. Edition Edition No. Authors Reason Validity Date ARC & Bruno Technical report released by ARC 0.3 19/08/2020 Desart (Version 1.1) and sent to reviewers ARC & Bruno Reformatting and 1st comments 0.6 21/08/2020 Desart included. 2nd version sent to reviewers ARC & Bruno 0.7 27/08/2020 Inclusion of reviewers’ comments. Desart ARC & Bruno 1.0 29/08/2020 Final release Desart 29/08/2020 Edition : 1.0 ii IMPACT ASSESSMENT OF COVID-19 MEASURES ON AIRPORT PERFORMANCE Table of Contents DOCUMENT CHARACTERISTICS ................................................................................... I EDITION HISTORY ........................................................................................................... II TABLE OF CONTENTS ................................................................................................... III EXECUTIVE SUMMARY .................................................................................................. 1 1 INTRODUCTION ...................................................................................................... 3 OBJECTIVE OF THE STUDY .............................................................................................3 AIRPORTS’ ACTIVITIES REQUIRED TO APPLY HEALTH SAFETY MEASURES ..........................4 PROJECT DESCRIPTION .................................................................................................6 GENERAL ANALYSIS FRAMEWORK ..................................................................................9 STRUCTURE OF THE DOCUMENT ................................................................................... 11 TERMINOLOGY ............................................................................................................ 12 2 IMPACT ANALYSIS BY TERMINAL PROCESS AND AREA ............................... 13 HEALTH CHECK .......................................................................................................... 13 CHECK-IN ................................................................................................................... 29 SECURITY CONTROL ................................................................................................... 49 DEPARTURE GATE AREAS ........................................................................................... 68 REMOTE BUS HANDLING ............................................................................................. 80 IMMIGRATION .............................................................................................................. 90 BAGGAGE RECLAIM ..................................................................................................... 97 TRANSFER PASSENGER HANDLING ............................................................................ 105 3 AIRCRAFT TURNAROUND ................................................................................. 110 4 CONCLUSION & RECOMMENDATIONS ............................................................ 126 IMPACT ANALYSIS ON PASSENGER JOURNEY .............................................................. 126 SATURATION CAPACITY ............................................................................................. 131 FURTHER RECOMMENDATIONS ................................................................................... 132 29/08/2020 Edition : 1.0 iii IMPACT ASSESSMENT OF COVID-19 MEASURES ON AIRPORT PERFORMANCE EXECUTIVE SUMMARY COVID-19 is a worldwide pandemic that led to an unprecedented crisis. In this crisis, the aviation industry was affected like no other industrial sector. Airports need to be secured in order to, first, minimise the risk of spreading the virus and, second, maintain trust and confidence into air transportation that has always been considered as the safest mode of transport. In order to support a safe and smooth recovery from COVID-19 lockdown, EASA/ECDC, ICAO, ACI, and IATA issued guidelines and recommendations. EUROCONTROL commissioned the Airport Research Center GmbH (ARC) to undertake a comprehensive study to assess the impact of the COVID-19 measures on airport performance, and terminal operations in particular, with the aim to support the European network to better prepare for COVID-19 traffic recovery. Six external partners largely contributed to the project: ACI EUROPE and IATA, and 4 airports, namely Paris Charles-de-Gaulle, London Heathrow, Stuttgart and Swedavia airports. In this study, the airport performance was analysed with the implementation of the COVID-19 measures (including 1.5m physical distance), compared to the pre-COVID situation. Based on data collected from the project partners and the simulation of a generic airport, this study provided: (i) an order of magnitude of the impact of these measures on the passengers’ journey time throughout a terminal, (ii) an assessment on the need for additional space for those facilities affected by the COVID measures, and (iii) an estimate of when airports are likely to reach their saturation capacity when traffic will recover. As far as departures are concerned, the compulsory COVID measures might add up to 10 minutes to the passengers’ journey. One concern is the suitable provision of staff to support the COVID measures, especially to compensate a reduced security control throughput which, if not addressed, could lead to backing up passengers into the terminal areas. In terms of space, the situation is more critical. Authoritative decisions about physical distance disrupt the airport’s former queue and gate sizing. For the same passenger number in a queue in the pre-COVID period, much more space is required to manage COVID: 50% at check-in; 100% at security control; and 35-50% in boarding gates. 29/08/2020 Edition : 1.0 1 IMPACT ASSESSMENT OF COVID-19 MEASURES ON AIRPORT PERFORMANCE The additional time required for the arriving passengers’ journey, due to the implementation of COVID measures, is within a range of 5 to 20 minutes. However, the provision of space is also quite critical. Immigration would need to double the space and baggage reclaim would require 30-50% more space for the same passenger number. New health checks measures on arrivals would have a considerable impact, in particular in transfers. For those airports already saturated before the COVID, the general saturation capacity with COVID measures is expected to be in the range of 60-75% of their pre-COVID traffic volume during peaks. Security control (in terms of throughput) and the boarding gates (in terms of space) are likely to be the limiting components at airports. Last but not least, this study identified that significant harmonisation of the measures is required and will be beneficial for all the parties involved. Consultation revealed that there exists a disparity in the implementation of the measures. Health forms should be harmonised at the European level as well as the criteria for the colour- coding used by the Member States and their regions to report about the pandemic evolution. It is strongly believed that this harmonisation at European level will improve the efficiency of the crisis management. 29/08/2020 Edition : 1.0 2 IMPACT ASSESSMENT OF COVID-19 MEASURES ON AIRPORT PERFORMANCE 1 Introduction Objective of the Study COVID-19 is a worldwide pandemic that led to an unprecedented crisis. In this crisis, the aviation industry has been affected like no other industrial sector, most likely because of its specific business model mainly based