Busy European airspace against busy North-American airspace.

[garp]

How do they compare? Has anybody had the opportunity to observe or even work a busy airspace on both sides of the Atlantic? E.g., Is the workload around LAX so much higher than around the London TMA or the other way around?

[HEATHROW DIRECTOR]

I've worked in the London TMA and visited a number of US ATC facilities. It is very difficult to compare the two as they work to different rules, with different traffic levels and the US has so much more available airspace than the UK. On the other hand, they have far more busy airfields than the UK.

[jackieofalltrades]

Will agree with HD there. The UK has some very complex and busy airspace, especially the London TMA. The London TMA is statistically the most busy and complex in Europe, with the Manchester TMA 5th. Although I've not seen how these compare to the US, but anecdotally I've heard the London TMA is the most complex in the world.

KATL typically has roughly twice the annual traffic movements of EGLL, but it also has more airspace in which to handle those movements.
I've been to units in North America, and seen that that start sequencing the arrivals for the major airfields, KORD, KATL, KDTW to name but a few from many hundreds of miles away. There isn't the space to be able to do that in the UK.

[AMF]

jackieofalltrades
I've been to units in North America, and seen that that start sequencing the arrivals for the major airfields, KORD, KATL, KDTW to name but a few from many hundreds of miles away. There isn't the space to be able to do that in the UK.

The 1000-pound gorilla of US ATC are the major convective weather systems that run through almost all eastern U.S. regions every few days for much of the year, the likes of which the UK almost never experiences.

Space? Take an 800-mile long squall line and pinch the Atlantic seaboard and Northeast US, and this routine, dynamic occurance will prevent ATC from developing in an overcomplicated way just for the sake of it. It has to remain routinely flexible to meet the dynamics that is not the relatively benign enviro found in the UK/Europe.

[thorisgod]

Mine is Bigger than yours.

Knew this would happen:zzz:

[jackieofalltrades]

Have to agree with you thorisgod, that was my concern too.

I and HD were responding to the original question, i.e. how does the airspace compare, NOT getting into a totally different (and in my opinion irreverent) debate of who is better.

[Vector361]

Interesting question. Not knowing anything about EGLL/LHR or anywhere else in Europe or the western US and their flows, I'd still be surprised if anywhere ran more traffic in a condensed area the NY TRACON and surrounding sectors @ Boston, New York, Cleveland & Washington Centers. NY TRACON has 3 of the top 25 airports worldwide for aircraft movement (2008 data- JFK,EWR&LGA ) within 20 miles. Toss in HPN & TEB and about 25 other smaller airports in the mix and the traffic is very heavy & complex and the airspace difficult to master. Often messy weather too. Regards to anyone close, where ever they are. And no, I never actually worked the "live" traffic in the area, but was an instructor (SYM) for the "new" controllers in one of those areas. Just my "nomination."

For traffic movement data -

World's busiest airports by traffic movements - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World%27s_busiest_airports_by_traffic_movements)

[Gonzo]

Most of Europe has airspace designed around very close national borders, not conduicive to efficient ATM, especially with each nation's military training areas within those borders.

If European airspace was redesigned by one single body and had to take account of only one nation's military air arms it would look very different.

[divingduck]

Thor and jackie of all trades...

I thought the response given by AMF was well put and reasoned. I don't remember seeing "mine is bigger than yours" being stated anywhere.
He/she has a point regarding the weather patterns, very rarely do you see anyone go too far off track in Europe, in other parts of the world, 100,150 or even 200 miles off track avoiding weather is fairly regular...
but that said, Gonzo has a very valid point...too many competing for the one small patch.

[HEATHROW DIRECTOR]

I had no wish to make comparisons on other than what I said earlier. Various agencies over the years have referred to Heathrow as the "world's busiest", which was, is and probably always will be just nonsense. For some years it hasn't been the busiest in Europe, let alone the world. However, the LTMA airspace is fairly congested. Many times I've told of showing round Heathrow some controllers from KORD. They looked at the radar and, poiting to the range rings, said: "Let's see, this is 100, 200 miles, right?" When I said: "No, 10, 20" they were somewhat surprised!

Weather is another matter and if I had a pound for every time I had become involved in weather avoidance in the LTMA I'd be a multi-millionaire. Even in the middle of "summer" we can still have horrendous weather problems causing delays.

I know that weather patterns have changed drastically over the years, but I met a few US pilots and ATCOs in my time and most commented on how bad the weather was here compared to "back home".

[HEATHROW DIRECTOR]

<<I would have loved to fly into Heathrow for £15, park on a GA ramp, and jump into a 747 as a passenger for a long-haul holiday!>>

Have you ever thought to compare the size of Heathrow with that of a busy US airfield? It's tiny by comparison. There used to be a GA area at Heathrow but it was swallowed up under T4. There is not the capacity, either on the ground or in the air for GA aircraft at Heathrow so the airport operators - not ATC - discourage them by charging huge fees. If the place was big enough and if the operator accepted GA traffic then ATC would accommodate them. It's no big deal fitting clockwork mice in with big jets, but someone has to get delayed and airlines don't like that when they have plane loads of paying passengers.

[tesox]

Well who wants busy and complex? I want the least amount of complexity, relaxing work environment, cool coworkers, with big pay cheques and wicked benefits.....

take your busy lives...I love my work!

;)

[HEATHROW DIRECTOR]

tesox.... Why stay anonymous. Tell us where you work, what you do.

I enjoyed being busy at work and earning reasonable pay, PLUS loads and loads of time off with my family. Great stuff.

And you.............?