AE3502 Landside

Calculation of Check-In facilities

In this assignment you have to calculate the number of check in desks needed to handle
the following flight schedule that consists of six different flights:
ID

Airline

FlightNo

ArrDep

Time

ACType

Seats

Pax

Trf

Destination

Flight
Type

KL

(KLM)

861

07:40

B738

122

84

31

BCN

(Barcelona)

Europe

KL

(KLM)

263

08:00

B737

164

107

52

LHR

(London
Heathrow)

Europe

KL

(KLM)

67

08:20

B772

318

96

194

NRT

(Tokyo)

Intercont

KL

(KLM)

55

08:40

A333

292

75

192

ATL

(Atlanta)

Intercont

KL

(KLM)

317

09:00

B737

122

62

46

CDG

(Paris)

Europe

KL

(KLM)

43

09:20

A332

243

122

94

JFK

(New York)

Intercont

Table 1: Flight Schedule

Please note that the column Pax contains the number of origin passengers (thus
excluding transfer passengers) and the column Trf contains the number of transfer
passengers.
Before you can calculate the required size for the departure hall and the number of checkin desks, you have to calculate the peak hour number that is generated by these flights.
Use the sliding window method (as described in the lecture) and apply the following arrival
pattern for the different flights:

Typical Passenger Arrival Pattern Check-in

% pax arriving for Check In

25%
20%

Domestic
15%

Europe
Intercont

10%

Charter
5%

0:00

0:10

0:20

0:30

0:40

0:50

1:00

1:10

1:20

1:30

1:40

1:50

2:00

2:10

2:20

2:30

0%

time before departure

Figure 1: Arrival pattern of different flight types for the check-in

You can find the exact numbers of the different arrival pattern in the Excel file
ArrivalPatterns.xls on the blackboard.
After deriving the peak hour value for check-in you can calculate the size of the departure
hall and the number of check-in desks needed to handle the passengers of the flight
schedule.
Use the following formula to calculate the departure hall size:

September 2015

AE3502 Landside

A LOS

y 3 PH _ Dep 1 Visitor _ DepPax

60
2

Assumption: 50% of pax during peak hour arrive within first 20 minutes

Peak hour number of departing passengers [PH_Dep]

Number of visitors per departing passengers [Visitor_DepPax]

Space required per person LoS of Wait/Circulate [LOS]

Average dwell time per pax/visitor (minutes) [y]

Use the following formula to calculate the departure lounge size:

u l v k
A LOS PH _ Dep

60

Peak hour number of departing passengers [PH_Dep]

Rate of long-haul (intercontinental) passengers [l] and average occupancy time [u]

Rate of short-haul passengers [k] and average occupancy time [v]

Space required per passenger (m) [LOS]

Use the following formula to calculate the number of passport desks:

PH _ Dep 50% t
20 min W

Peak hour number of departing passengers [PH_Dep]

Average processing time per passenger (minutes) [t]

Acceptable waiting time (minutes) [W]

Assume the check in desks are only used by non-transfer passengers and the passport
desks are only used by intercontinental flights.
Level of Service Standard
Activity

Situation

Waiting and Circulating

Moving about freely

2,7m2

2,3m2

1,9m2

1,5m2

1,0m2

break

Check-In queues

Moving, with bags

1,8m2

1,6m2

1,4m2

1,2m2

1,0m2

break

Hold room, controls

Queued, without bags

1,4m

break

Bag reclaim area

Moving, with bags

2,0m

break

1,2m

1,8m

1,0m

1,6m

0,8m

1,4m

0,6m
1,2m

Assume the following values:

Level of Service:

Average number of visitors per passenger:

0.5

Average dwell time per person (pax + visitors):

20 minutes

September 2015

AE3502 Landside
Average check in time per passenger:

3 minutes

Average occupancy time per short haul passenger: 30 minutes

Average occupancy time per long haul passenger: 50 minutes
Average passport processing time per passenger: 45 seconds
Acceptable waiting time per passenger:

2 minutes

Questions to answer
1.1 What is the peak hour for the check-in facilities generated by the flights? Apply the
method for common check-in.
1.2 What is the number of passengers for the check-in desk during this peak hour?
1.3 How large does the departure hall need to be to handle the flights?
1.4 How many check-in counters are needed to handle the flights?
1.5 How many passport desks are needed to handle the flights?
1.6 How large does the (shared) departure lounge have to be?
1.7 Assume the airport has 10 check-in desks. If all check-in desks would be used as
common-check-ins with average processing time of 2 minutes, what would be the
theoretical reachable peak hour capacity at the check-in?
Finish your assignment before the start of the next lecture. Create a single PDF and
upload it to blackboard.
In case you have questions you can contact me via Email: P.C.Roling@tudelft.nl.

September 2015