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OCR for page 25
Six Steps in a Market-Based Strategy for Improving Airport Ground Access 25
as either all exurban in nature or all urban in nature. The following airports are good illustrative Key Challenges in
examples of three types of markets:
Step 4
· An Airport Oriented to a Dense Urban Market. To San Francisco International Airport, the
· Design a set of
majority of trips come from areas in which airport trip ends are densely concentrated: about
18,000 air travelers come from zones with more than 50 trip ends per square mile; this area services for
has an overall average of about 225 trip ends per square mile. San Francisco has the nation's a dense urban
single largest market for airport trips from the kind of highly concentrated trip ends that can
be served by a variety of fixed-route and -schedule modes, including rail. market
· An Airport Oriented to an Exurban Market. To Denver International Airport, more than an exurban
9,000 air travelers come from zones that have trip densities of less than 5 trips per square mile. market
Of the 27 most transit-oriented U.S. airports, Denver's airport had the highest volume of
"exurban" trip ends, which come from highly dispersed zones of origin. a middle
· An Airport Oriented to a Middle Market. To Los Angeles International Airport, the major- market
ity of airport trips come from market areas that are neither dense nor exurban in nature: about
· Incorporate the
21,000 air travelers originate in areas with less than 50 trip ends per square mile but more than
5 trip ends per square mile; this area has an overall average of about 15 trip ends per square attributes of the
mile. This area represents the United States' largest market for medium-density modes, such successful sys-
as door-to-door vans.
tems, including
quality of
Step 4: Design a Program of Services and Strategies Line-haul
for Airport Ground Access service to CBD
Having established an understanding of the nature of the markets for airport access services, a connection at
ground access strategy can be developed to include a set of services appropriate to the submarkets
revealed. During this step, a set of candidate modal services must be selected, determined by the the airport
needs of the travelers and by the ability of the markets to support specific services. At this point, service
decisions must be made between investment in rail versus bus systems. beyond the
The decision about whether to build a rail system to a U.S. airport may be driven more by CBD
the overall public transportation strategy of the region rather than by airport access needs in
isolation. When a region, such as San Francisco, has invested heavily in downtown rail appropriate
distribution services and other regional connections through the system, extension of baggage
that system to cover the airport can be seen as part of a regional transportation strategy. By
strategy
contrast, when the rail services do not currently serve a major role in a bigger network of
collection and distribution, the investment in a stand-alone rail system to the airport may not · Design a set of
make sense. services to appeal
In this phase of the process of improving public modes to major airports, services must be to four market
designed to achieve certain service quality attributes revealed in the analysis of successful systems
segments:
around the world. Chapter 3 summarizes a set of attributes that are important for services. Those
attributes are not specifically tied to the choice of bus versus rail but rather describe the needs of Resident
the traveler without regard to mode or technology. business
Resident
Lessons Learned from Successful Systems non-business
The key lessons from the analysis of international systems presented in Chapter 3 do not form Non-resident
an argument for or against rail solutions in the United States. The key issue is to understand the business
attributes of service from the European experience and to design services that deal with those
attributes. Each of the four attribute areas defined in that chapter can be reviewed for the impli- Non-resident
cations for a choice of mode in the United States. non-business
OCR for page 26
26 Ground Access to Major Airports by Public Transportation
Quality of the Line-Haul Connection to the CBD
Finding an available right-of-way is a problem for the designer of a bus access system and for
the designer of a rail system. Finding an available express track has been determined to be a prob-
lem throughout Europe. Multistop rail transit service in London was perceived to be so slow that
new, non-stop rail was created. Planners at Munich's airport are looking at magnetic levitation
(maglev) alternatives to deal with the historically slow rail travel times there. Universally, buses
stalled in general-purpose traffic cannot provide a competitive advantage over the automobile.
By contrast, volumes on the Braintree Logan Express bus service (Boston) increased by 50%
when a bus lane was added to the system. If the metropolitan system can provide free-flowing
bus lanes, total travel times may well be lower by bus. Simply extending multistop local service
to include the airport is a formula doomed to failure.
Quality of Connection at the Airport
The selection of the rail mode does not ensure a good quality connection from the baggage pick-
up location, nor does the selection of bus preclude a good connection. In Europe, some rail stations
are located immediately adjacent to a common baggage pick-up location, while other rail stations
require clumsy, uncomfortable connections by bus shuttle vehicles. In the United States, connecting
charter buses leave from the Las Vegas airport from within a unified terminal complex adjacent to
a common baggage pick-up area, while many U.S. rail services operate from locations far from major
baggage pick-up areas. This issue of the high-quality connection between airline operations and the
ground access vehicle needs to be solved for whatever ground mode is selected.
On the other hand, the new data from Oakland challenges the assumption that directness of
connection is more important than underlying market conditions. Certain market segments,
such as resident non-business, may be willing to put up with lower levels of service amenity in a
trade-off with more important trip-making objectives.
Quality of the Connecting Service Beyond the Terminal
Providing high-quality services to areas beyond the traditional downtown is a problem for
both rail and bus systems. Connections between the major rail terminals in downtown London
are difficult, and the mode share for Heathrow air travelers to connecting national rail service is
low. By contrast, trains from Zurich Airport rail station are totally integrated into the national
rail system, and mode share to national destinations is extremely high. The Newark Liberty
International Airport rail station provides a case study of the appeal of longer distance rail
services as a mode of airport ground access; at the present time, the market patterns are not
showing the expected growth in ridership there.
The Existence of a Strategy for Baggage
While the designers of airport ground access systems must deal with the impediment of bag-
gage and its negative impact on the choice of public modes, this report has created a compre-
hensive discussion of the failure--through much of the world--of downtown airport check-in
terminals operated by airline personnel. Chapter 5 documents problems at downtown terminals
serving London Heathrow, London Gatwick, Munich, Newark, and Madrid airports, while
reporting more positive market experiences in Hong Kong, Vienna, Moscow, and Kuala
Lumpur. Systems operating national, longer distance rail equipment, such as that in use in
Copenhagen, can allow for the use of existing baggage storage areas. For rail systems operating
standard commuter and rapid transit equipment, the problem is only rarely solved in a manner
satisfactory to the traveler with large baggage.
Generically, the accommodation of baggage is not an issue between bus and rail, but rather is
an attribute to be sought by the service designer. Dealing with the baggage issue tends to argue for
