Managing Traffic at Airports – Connecting the Data

Congestion is the scourge of city life, but nowhere does it have quite such significant effects as when it occurs around international airports. When passengers and crew miss their flights, the knock-on effect can create air travel pandemonium that stretches out to other cities and countries.

For Auckland International Airport, this is exactly what played out in December 2016. An undetected early-afternoon incident triggered a succession of events that by 5pm turned a routine 20-minute journey into a 90-minute crawl. The resulting public, media and political outcry hardened the resolve of the airport, Auckland Transport and the New Zealand Transport Agency (NZTA) to do all they could to prevent a reoccurrence.