Aviation: Welcome to Intelligent Airports

More and more passengers are using airports that are already congested which are adding up to increasing bottlenecks at checkpoints and more frustration for passengers trying to catch their flight. Helping to address the problem is the deployment of sensor technologies throughout the airport terminals with the aim of increasing automation and self-service options for passengers.

There are 2 types of technologies that are getting serious attention - Bluetooth and Near Field Communications (NFC).

Cut the Queues and the Stress

Bluetooth is commonly used for wireless communication between electronic consumer products and peripherals such as a laptop and printer or a mobile phone and the earpiece. Despite being around since 1999, its use in air travel is still in its infancy.

However most travelers today carry a mobile phone with bluetooth capability and trials indicate somewhere between 10% and 20% of passengers have them switched to 'discoverable' mode. This is considered enough for a reliable and consistent flow of data for measuring traffic flows and queue lengths in and around airports.

Individuals are not identifiable, so respecting privacy issues with the tracking done anonymously and only used in aggregate to analyze traffic patterns and movements.

In Europe, a number of major hubs, including Heathrow and Frankfurt, are already piloting bluetooth systems for queue monitoring. By obtaining 'live' information on traffic flows, airport operators can react much quicker to unfolding events by taking tactical actions, such as deploying extra staff and equipment at bottlenecks, to ensure a proper flow of passengers towards the aircraft.

There can be addition benefits for travelers willing to broadcast their whereabouts. Research from one trial showed that the average traveler checks the flight information displays around 4 to 5 times before going to the gate. By enabling bluetooth, passengers can receive accurate time to the gate reducing their anxiety levels.

But it is not just the passengers that win. Airlines and airports are also seeing the potential. A small number of airports are using bluetooth for proximity marketing campaigns.

One example is with tourism offices, where visiting passengers are asked to switch on bluetooth in their mobile phones as they leave the aircraft, allowing them to receive news on special events with discount vouchers as they depart the airport.

This ability to connect passengers with information at the right time, and in the right place, for it to be useful and actionable is driving one of the hottest trends in retail marketing - location based services, or LBS, as it is fast becoming known. It offers airlines and airports an opportunity to connect with passengers throughout their journey through the airport and inspire them to consider things they may not have thought about before.

Bluetooth could also help the airlines with late passengers. With web or mobile check-in increasingly common, airlines cannot be sure if some passengers have actually made it to airport until they show at the gate.

Speeding up Processing with NFC

Another exciting development for travelers at airports is an alternative wireless sensor technology called Near Field Communication, more commonly known as NFC. It is a subset of Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) used in car keys, but limits the range of communication to within ten centimeters or four inches, making it much more suitable for situations where data security is an issue. It also has the added advantage over bluetooth of working even when the receiving device is switched off.

Such is its potential within air travel that IATA joined forces with the GSM association to produce a white paper exploring 6 use cases where mobile NFC could bring benefits to air-travelers and the air transport industry. Namely, passenger check-in, baggage check-in, security check-point, lounge access, boarding, and post-flight.

The idea is to send a digital form of the current 2D boarding pass to be stored on the mobile phone's SIM card. By 'waving' the phone close to an NFC reader, the boarding pass is authenticated and the passenger able to complete without human intervention the steps in their journey.

While there are obvious benefits for passengers in terms of convenience and simplification of the journey, today there are not many NFC-enabled phones available to justify a widespread industry rollout of the infrastructure. However according to Juniper Research that is changing and by 2014 nearly 300 mn, or 20% of smartphones shipped, will have NFC capabilities.

Airlines are not waiting. Japan Airlines is the first airline to publicly commit to NFC based mobile boarding passes, while Qantas is using a contactless card version of the technology to act as a boarding pass throughout the airport touch points.

Europe too is catching on to the possibilities. France's Toulouse-Blagnac airport has become the world's first airport to trial SIM based NFC to allow passengers to pass through the airport's checks, controls, and gates using only their mobile phones. The phone will effectively become the passengers' pass allowing them access to car parking, the boarding area via a premium access zone and to a premium passenger lounge.

Sensing the Future

Today sensor technologies at airports are still a work in progress. However with the uptake of smartphones soaring using wireless sensors for automating touch points and connecting with travelers as they transit the airport will become commonplace. However a critical enabler for widespread adoption will be the development of standards and common processes that are device and mobile network operator (MNO) independent.

MANEESH JAIKRISHNA
The author is vice president,
SITA India and Sub-Continent
maildqindia@cybermedia.co.in