The Stanswood Consulting Technical Paper Series shares practical engineering experience gained during more than 35 years of international airport projects.
These papers are not intended to promote products, software or individual vendors. Their purpose is to encourage good engineering practice, stimulate professional discussion and help airport owners, consultants, designers and contractors deliver systems that are easier to integrate, operate and maintain.
Information Exchange Is an Operational Discipline
Modern airports depend upon the continuous movement of accurate, timely and reliable operational information between airlines, airport systems, operational stakeholders and external agencies.
Flight schedules, passenger status, baggage information, stand allocations, weather data, security events and operational decisions all originate from different sources. Effective Master Systems Integration must ensure that the correct information reaches the correct people and systems, in the required format and at the time it is needed.
The Airport Operational Information Exchange Environment
Airport operational information originates both within and outside the airport. Airline host systems, Departure Control Systems, Air Navigation Service Providers, meteorological services, industry messaging platforms and airport operational systems all contribute information required to support the airport operation.
The architecture used to exchange this information will vary between airports. The objective of MSI is therefore not to impose a single technical architecture, but to establish the operational information requirements and ensure that the required consumers receive consistent and dependable data.
Information Ownership and the Authoritative Source
Multiple systems may contain the same information, but they do not necessarily own it. The authoritative source is the recognised system or organisation responsible for creating, validating and maintaining a specific item of operational information.
Establishing the authoritative source prevents conflicting information from developing across the airport environment and ensures that operational decisions are based upon consistent and trusted data.
The Information Exchange Lifecycle
Operational information is continually created, validated, published, consumed, updated and archived throughout the operational day.
Every interface identified during MSI should support a defined operational requirement and one or more stages of this information lifecycle.
Information Exchange Models
There is no single method by which information should be exchanged within a modern airport.
The paper considers direct system-to-system interfaces, Airport Integration Platforms such as an Integration Broker or Enterprise Service Bus, external industry messaging services and hybrid architectures that combine several approaches.
The selected model should be driven by operational, technical, security and business requirements rather than by a preference for one technology.
Future-Proofing Airport Information Exchange
Airport systems are continually upgraded, replaced and expanded. A change to one system may therefore have significant technical, operational and commercial implications across the wider airport environment.
Open standards, published interface specifications and vendor-neutral integration mechanisms can improve interoperability and reduce unnecessary supplier dependency. Effective lifecycle management also requires current documentation, configuration management, version control, impact assessment and regression testing.
Information Quality and Governance
The value of an airport information exchange is determined not by the quantity of information exchanged, but by the quality and integrity of that information.
Accuracy, timeliness, completeness, consistency, availability, security and traceability all influence whether operational information can be trusted.
Information Exchange as an MSI Discipline
Software suppliers develop the interfaces associated with their own systems, but Master Systems Integration must maintain the complete operational information view.
MSI identifies the information required to support airport operations, establishes ownership and authoritative sources, coordinates interface requirements and verifies that information is exchanged accurately and reliably throughout the project lifecycle.
What the Full Paper Covers
SC-TP-004 – Information Exchange in Modern Airports: The Foundation of Master Systems Integration examines operational information exchange from an airport and MSI perspective.
The full paper covers the airport information exchange environment, information ownership and authoritative sources, the information lifecycle, exchange models, future-proofing, open standards, information quality, governance and the role of MSI throughout the operational life of the airport.
Who Should Read This Paper?
This paper is intended for Airport Owners, Airport Operators, programme directors, designers, contractors, system suppliers and operational stakeholders responsible for defining, delivering or maintaining airport systems and information interfaces.