2023 AGENDA

Intelligent Approach is an arrival spacing tool developed by NATS and Leidos that helps airports to safely maximise their runway throughput, supporting growth and operational resilience. Working closely with the NAV CANADA controllers in Toronto, the Intelligent Approach team was able to configure IA to specifically take into account and then mitigate the ‘Tailwinds Aloft’ problem, functionality that was designed for Toronto Pearson, but is now a core part of the IA product offering. IA has added tactical capacity across the airport’s five runways - helping to reduce delay, increase resilience in strong headwind conditions, and improve overall consistency. Early results indicate reductions in average spacing between arrivals of up to 6% for various aircraft pairs. These results are demonstrative of a shift towards greater consistency in delivering arrival spacing which will ultimately support maximizing capacity with continued air traffic growth.