APMs and Airport Mobility—Historic Trends and Future Possibilities

Automated People Movers (APMs) have helped meet the evolving passenger mobility needs at major international airports for over 40 years. Since the first APM implementation at Tampa in 1971, APMs' mobility capabilities have improved in terms of speed, capacity and frequency. These improvements have allowed airports to grow in size and still meet the level-of-service requirements of the traveling public. With a number of airports approaching passenger volumes of 100 million annually, the demand for the high-quality mobility service provided by APMs has never been greater. This paper documents the technical improvements of the APM technology over the past 40 years and correlates these mobility improvements with the increases in airport annual passenger volumes. APMs are placed into the context of the range of technologies that serve today's major airports' mobility needs. The use of APMs at airports in a growing number of world regions is also detailed. Finally, the paper looks at potential future improvements to the APM technology that will allow airports to handle annual passenger volumes far in access of 100 million. APM Conference topics covered in this paper will include: 1. History - past experience and lessons learned; 2. Airports - assessment of newly implemented projects; and 3. PRT - status of on-going and planned PRT projects at airports. This paper should benefit the professional airport and transport community by defining the historic relationship between an airport's internal transport systems and the airport's annual passenger volume and to see what that relationship may mean for the future.