Europe’s ATM map is being redrawn by forward-thinking nations that are not waiting for the single sky legislation to decide their future
The political difficulty of creating a multinational block of airspace cannot be overstated, so it is creditable that an agreement to implement the Central European Air Traffic Services (CEATS) programme has been reached.
The rationale that brought the CEATS countries together in the name of air traffic management (ATM) efficiency is the same, in miniature, as that for creating the Single European Sky (SES). It is worth examining this in the context of recent European aviation history to understand better what it will take to make the SES happen within the necessary timeframe. Although the SES is an obvious strategy for better ATM, that alone has never been sufficient motivation to clear the political and legal obstacles in its path.
The CEATS states have created what Eurocontrol’s director of ATM strategies Bo Redeborn refers to as a “bottom up” functional airspace block (FAB), in the sense that the inspiration came from within rather than being imposed from outside. In cases like this, creation springs from the recognition by a group of neighbouring states – usually geographically small ones – that their interests would be better served by combining their upper airspace into a single unit for ATM purposes. Central and eastern Europe handles large volumes of transiting high-level traffic. Jets enter and leave the national airspace of smaller countries within minutes, creating the need for rapid radio frequency changes that are time-wasting and workload-increasing both on the ground and in the air and, at worst, are a potential cause for confusion and therefore for error.
Actually, the CEATS agreement has not yet been cemented in its entirety. But there is unlikely to be any turning back from the position the eight participating nations have taken, because they all took it voluntarily. Of the eight, five have signed up completely to the deal, and are going ahead with implementation with the blessing of the remaining, hesitant three. The latter have pledged to make their final decisions before the end of 2006. Those going ahead with implementation are Austria, Bosnia and Hezegovina, Croatia, Hungary and Slovakia; Slovenia has not signed yet, but its agreement looks imminent, and the Czech Republic and Italy (only the north-eastern sector of Italian airspace would be involved) will make final decisions within 18 months.
As a “bottom-up” project, it is not the only one, and certainly not the first. But it is the most complex so far and involves the greatest number of states. The single, northern European multinational upper airspace block managed by the Maastricht upper area control centre in the Netherlands was created for the same reason. Moves toward its formation began in the 1960s. Belgium, Luxembourg and the Netherlands, which also have to cope with a constant flow of high level en-route traffic, agreed to combine their upper airspace into a single block now extending also into Germany, but it was not until the early 1990s before Maastricht became as autonomous a sector as it is now. It took two years of ATM logjam and chaos in 1987-8 for politicians to realise change was needed, and Maastricht was one fruit of this enlightenment.
About a year ago there was another bottom-up airspace consolidation deal. The UK and Ireland committed themselves to combining their upper airspace into a block. Perhaps, theoretically, if there were enough of these voluntary airspace consolidation agreements the SES could create itself piecemeal. Not so, says Redeborn. There has to be top-down airspace design as well, because the whole purpose of FABs is not just to improve ATM efficiency within their own limits, but their borders must also be subject to redesign if that is required to improve European-scale ATM. Meanwhile, those states that do not naturally move towards SES-type consolidation, or make the political and legal changes to achieve it, will eventually be pushed in that direction. The European Union’s SES legislation has empowered Eurocontrol to do this.
But there is another motive for moving before Eurocontrol starts pushing: to get ahead of the game. It is not fanciful to suggest that the British and Irish are combining not only to create a larger and more efficient FAB, but to position their ambitious air navigation service providers to be among Europe’s elite. Any European national provider – and government – that does not realise the future of European upper airspace will be in the hands of well-positioned multinational organisations is getting behind the game already.
Source: Flight International
