ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Saturday, July 13, 1996 TAG: 9607150032
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: GREG EDWARDS STAFF WRITER
THE AIR TRANSPORTATION center will address such issues as air traffic control, navigation, communication and aviation economics.
Virginia Tech has been picked by the Federal Aviation Administration to be part of a team of four universities that will serve in the airline safety agency's new operations research effort.
Joining Tech as part of the FAA's new Air Transportation Center of Excellence in Operations Research will be the University of California, Berkeley; Massachusetts Institute of Technology; and the University of Maryland.
FAA Administrator David R. Hinson described the university consortium as a "dream team" of some of the best minds in the country to work collectively on safety, business and operational issues.
Specifically, the center will address such issues as air traffic management and control; human factors; navigation; communication; and aviation economics. Tech's industrial and systems engineering and civil engineering departments will be contributing faculty to the center.
Center directors will be based at MIT and Berkeley, and associate directors at Maryland and Virginia Tech. Tony Trani, an associate professor of civil engineering and Tech's associate center director, said a team of 35 researchers at the four universities will be involved with the center's work.
The center will work to implement new ideas and projects, Trani said. Specific projects will be decided on when the center's representatives meet with the FAA in late August, he said.
One major project that the center likely will work on, he said, is development of a free-flight system under which airline pilots would be free to pick their flight routes in consultation with air traffic controllers rather than flying along established preferred routes as they do now. The free-flight concept, which is already used for high altitude flying, would probably be safer and be more efficient that the system currently in use, Trani said.
The center also will be a teaching magnet for the schools, Trani said. A substantial amount of center funding will support graduate students, he said.
The center initially has a three-year, $3 million budget. The FAA will provide $1.5 million; the universities - with the help of sponsoring aviation companies such as Boeing, American Airlines and Federal Express - will provide the rest.
Depending on how the first three years go, the FAA's participation is expected to last 10 years. But the center is expected to become self-supporting by the end of that time.
Hinson said the center represents a model for government reform in that the FAA, industry and academia are coming together to focus research on things that can be put to immediate use.
The center also will offer seminars and short courses to the aviation industry, Trani said.
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