The purpose of Federal Aviation Regulations Part 77, entitled “Objects Affecting Navigable Airspace”, is to identify potential hazards and prevent adverse impacts to the safe and efficient use of navigable airspace. The Obstruction Identification Surfaces (OIS), depicting these regulations, identify objects that penetrate these imaginary surfaces, evaluate hazardous effects, and ensure safe separations of aircraft from obstructions. The OIS evaluation is often used for selecting airfield locations and runway orientations. More importantly, the OIS evaluation is an airport’s safeguard against flawed urban development, especially for airports near rapidly expanding cities. Without accurate analysis tools, hand-calculation errors on the OIS can occur and cause adverse impacts to airport safety. Applying the GIS features of geospatial data and 3D formats, this paper proposes a model which is capable of precisely calculating restrictive heights and creating visual imagery of penetrating obstructions. The special features of the model include Web-based design, adaptability to any airport, multiple inquiry methods, quick response to inquiries, and response with 3D visual reality. The proposed model is useful for airport design and safety management.

http://terpconnect.umd.edu/~swchang/      Journal of Advanced Tranportation, Working Paper