| The need for realistic measures of passenger benefit resulting from infrastructure investments at airports has returned to the forefront of concern for airport planners. This is due to recent Federal Aviation Administration policy decisions mandating more comprehensive benefit-cost analyses to justify moderate to major airport construction projects. The research presented contributes to fulfilling this need by examining how investment in intra-terminal transportation is valued by airport visitors.; A brief description of the evolution of modern airport terminals details the growing dependence and eventual integration of intra-terminal transportation systems into terminal designs. An evaluation of current benefit analyses are described, motivating the need for the research at hand. A comparison of automated pedestrian movement (APM) system technologies, including moving walkways and people movers, is presented, discussing the relative benefits of each in different airport environments. People movers are found to best serve passengers traveling distances up to five miles between airport facilities, while moving walkways are most advantageous in terminal concourses, covering distances up to 500 feet. Disadvantages to each system, such as people mover waiting times, and slow belt speeds of moving walkways, are discussed.; An assessment of the benefits of moving walkways, the most common of airport APM systems, is presented. Focussed in this assessment is a framework of analytical models, calibrated using empirically collected data of moving walkway utilization. A model estimating pedestrian walking speeds reveal that moving walkways reduce the average walking speed of pedestrians, thus increasing average travel times within a corridor. The value of moving walkways, in units of time, is estimated based on this result, by way of a random utility discrete choice logit model. The value is found to vary based on observable pedestrian characteristics and the density of traffic the walkway.; The assessment is applied by examining the benefits of hypothetical infrastructure improvements. Installing parallel moving walkways, for example, reveal significant benefit increases, particularly when an existing single moving walkway is operating at or near capacity. The results presented may be used to justify the installation of automated pedestrian movement systems in airport terminals as well as provide ways to assess appropriate finance measures to support such systems. |
