Over the years, ICAO has consistently recommended airport stakeholders´ real time access to surface surveillance data, as a means to foster efficiency, capacity and safety of surface operations.
ICAO Doc 9830 (A-SMGCS Manual) establishes that "an advanced surface movement guidance and control system is expected to provide adequate capacity and safety in relation to specific weather conditions, traffic density and aerodrome layout, by making use of modern technologies and a high level of integration between the various functionalities."
Moreover, ICAO GANP (Global Air Navigation Plan) reiterates the importance of real time access to surface surveillance data for both efficiency and safety of surface operations:
GANP ASBU-SURF B0/2 (Comprehensive Situation Awareness of Surface Operations)
"The surveillance service of A-SMGCS provides airport traffic situational awareness through the position, identification and tracking of aircraft and vehicle suitably equipped on the aerodrome surface. Information is presented on the controller and airport operator display, independent of visibility conditions and controller line of sight."
GANP ASBU-SURF B0/3 (Initial ATCO Alerting Service for Surface Operations)
"The ATCO will be provided with a short term conflicting alerting tool (A-SMGCS initial alerting service) that monitors movements on or near the runway and detects conflicts between an aircraft and another vehicle as well as runway incursion by intruders. Appropriate alerts will be visualized on the ATCO display."
Where the world is, today!
As Air Transport Service demand peaks up worldwide, the importance of the use of surveillance technologies for airport surface operations has grown so dramatically, that both the FAA and Eurocontrol, for cost reasons, are actively working to validate the use of lower cost cooperative surveillance ? Multilateration/ADS-B (no Surface Movement Radar), for improvement of Air Traffic Control services.
Detailed information on FAA´s and Eurocontrol´s initiatives may be found at:
- FAA´s SAI ? Surface Awareness Initiative
(https://www.faa.gov/newsroom/faa-install-new-runway-safety-technology) - Eurocontrol SMAS ? Surface Movement and Awareness System
(https://www.eurocontrol.int/sites/default/files/2025-05/eurocontrol-annual-network-operations-report-2024.pdf)
The Way Forward
Bearing in mind that, within the existing scenario, the deployment of lower cost cooperative surveillance networks (Multilateration/ADS-B) may now serve both Air Traffic Control and Airport Surface Management purposes, well ATM educated stakeholders, operating at busy airports, are now presented with the unique opportunity of safely and efficiently managing higher traffic levels at lower costs, under a truly collaborative environment.
Less ATM educated regions have had enough of silo culture and "who pays for what" attitude towards situation awareness investments for a safer and more efficient operation.
Let´s simultaneously tackle ICAO GANP ASBU-SURF B0/2 and B0/3.
ATMWISE will be delighted to demonstrate that Air Navigation Service Providers, Airport Operators, Airlines, Ground Handlers, working together as one, can get way more with far less.