An interactive 4D visualization system for air traffic concept analysis

The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) and supporting organizations are developing new concepts to improve efficiency and safety of the National Airspace System (NAS). Some of these concepts change current restrictions, introduce new maneuvers, or provide better decision support to air traffic controllers. Each of these concepts requires extensive research and validation before it can be integrated into the NAS. Many different analysis tools are used to determine benefits, limitations, and requirements of these concepts. Some of these tools provide statistical metrics of the concepts, while others show the concepts visually. However, many of these are specialized tools built specifically for analyzing one concept or a small subset of concepts in a specific region of the NAS. When a new concept is introduced, it is often difficult to find a tool that can easily be adapted to help analyze it. The Concept Analysis Branch at the FAA is tasked with analyzing many of these concepts for feasibility and benefits determination before requirements development occurs. In order to assist in this task, the Concept Analysis Branch has developed a flexible, extensible, interactive 4D visualization tool for analysis of virtually any aviation concept. Flexible Flight Traffic Exploration Visualization 4D (FliteViz4D) was created as a unique development platform specifically directed at visualizing air traffic concepts in three-dimensional space, with two additional temporal dimensions for current time and future time. It allows concepts such as 4D Trajectory Based Operations, National Convective Weather Forecast, and 3D Path Arrival Management to be visualized in all their dimensions. This was accomplished by using object-oriented design concepts in the development of FliteViz4D to provide unparalleled flexibility and extensibility. New concepts can be added into the visualization using plugins with no changes to the existing platform. The user can decide which plugins to use, determining exactly how Flite-Viz4D runs and what is visualized. The result is a powerful visualization and analysis system, scalable from a single airport to the entire world, which can be used to analyze any concept that could possibly be visualized abstractly or physically. This paper will provide an overview of the system, providing several examples of how it has been used in recent studies, how it will be used in future studies, and how it can be utilized by other organizations in the aviation industry.