"Dynastrip": a time-line approach for improving the air traffic picture of ATCOS

In the future, en-route air traffic controllers have to safely manage increasing numbers of aircraft. To this end, understanding air traffic by constructing a mental picture is a key stage in controller work, since it helps increase their capacity for anticipating and predicting the movement of aircraft. The quality and speed of construction of the controllers' mental picture of air traffic depend on how the information is presented. This was the basis for an experiment conducted at the EUROCONTROL Experimental Centre to test and validate a method for presenting information on the route part of the flight plans based on a time-line. The concept, known as Dynastrip, involves positioning navigation beacons chronologically and displaying their estimated overflight times on a time line. The time line has a fixed reference point, i.e. the current time. The estimated overflight times for the beacons are updated on the basis of radar data. With this presentation method, the controller can at any time see, without having to make any calculations, the present and future positions of the aircraft in relation to the beacons and among themselves. 16 operational en-route controllers and 16 student controllers took part in the experiment, which involved comparing Dynastrip with the traditional method of presenting information in tests involving traffic analysis, integrating aircraft and locating aircraft in space. Measuring performance as regards analysis time, conflict detection and number of errors, as well as interviews with the subjects, demonstrate that Dynastrip has considerable potential for improving the mental air traffic picture of controllers.