National Special Activity Airspace Project
Metron Aviation is developing the functional requirements for a series of automated systems to electronically capture and disseminate the status of all types and instances of Special Activity Airspace (SAA) throughout the National Airspace System (NAS). SAA includes the majority of current Special Use Airspace, Temporary Flight Restrictions, and a number of other airspace types which may necessitate restricted access. Metron Aviation’s work also assisted and followed concurrent efforts to develop a Concept of Operations (ConOps) document for the system.
Metron Aviation developed the Functional Requirements Document (FRD), storyboard walkthroughs, activity and process diagrams to assist the NSAAP members and participant Subject Matter Experts (SMEs) in conceptualizing the system. In addition, these tools helped the Metron Aviation team facilitate requirements discussions and the eventual definition of the FRD. Interfaces to several other automated systems currently being developed within Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) and Department of Defense (DoD) are being considered and included in the FRD.
The goal of the National Special Activity Airspace Project (NSAAP)—to develop a capability to schedule and distribute the status of all types of SAA—poses numerous challenges specifically in the arena of FAA and DoD-FAA-Civil aviation airspace control and coordination policies. Metron Aviation has played an instrumental role in all NSAAP brainstorming sessions identifying policy gaps, recommendations on relevant FAA policy changes, and analyzing other policy matters to facilitate an effective FAA-DoD interaction in the future system.
