ICAO South American and North American, Central American and Caribbean Offices have taken a giant step towards improvement of surface operations´ efficiency, capacity and safety, specially at regions where ICAO long time recommendation - adoption of Apron Management Service, boosted by surface surveillance technologies, has been historically ignored.
Latin America and the Caribbean are perfect examples (I can testify it myself), but I guess many other regions might equally benefit from ICAO´s guidance review.
Final Report of GREPECA´s 22th Meeting encourages Airport Operators to look at surface operations´ capacity increase, prior to interfering with airlines´ flight intentions, by means of CDM based initiatives, such a Ground Delay Program and Pre-Departure Sequencing.
Who wants to delay flights and/or squeeze operational flexibility, prior to taking the most of airport physical infrastructure ?
That´s exactly what premature and poorly understood adoption of Ground Delay Program and Pre-Departure Sequencing do !
Airport Operators, Airlines and Regulatory Agencies in Latin America and the Caribbean are starting to understand what effective Apron Management Service (which is not CONTROL) means.
Apron is a non-controlled zone of the airport, where hundreds of people operate, under guidance from dozens of entities and no centralized management. All massive investment of Airport Operators and Airlines, in the optimization of Passenger Terminal processes are being wasted in an unmanaged zone, also under Airport Operator´s responsibility - the Apron !
Wise Airport Operators and Airlines are finally realizing that implementing Apron Management Service means to expand their Operations Control optimization efforts, into a busy, critical and unmanaged area of their operations. Regardless of which entity runs it, an effective Apron Management Center, should act as an outpost of Airport´s Operations Control Center.
That is something Air Traffic Controllers will never have under their responsibility.
Have a look at Apron Management, at Houston International Airport, to get a feel of what effective Apron Management Service can do, for Airport Operators and Airlines.