Use the data you have been provided to explore where current congestion issues are likely to occur and where the most significant bottleneck(s) exist. To do this, you will need to do some simple calculations.

For example, if the current peak demand is 5,750 passengers/hour and this includes arriving and departing passengers, how many passengers do you expect the security checkpoint needs to deal with? What assumption(s) do you need to make? Refer to the Assumption bank below to check that your assumptions are realistic.

Here are some possible bottlenecks you might investigate.

• Security screening
• Passport control
• Aircraft turnaround time
• Gate allocation conflicts
• Baggage handling delays

Choose what you consider are the most important bottleneck(s) to focus on. Make sure you have a well-reasoned justification for why you chose this bottleneck/these bottlenecks, making all your assumptions explicit. You will have to rely on the calculations you did and the assumptions you made to make this decision. Remember that you can choose more than one bottleneck to work on, if you like.

Dig deeper into your chosen bottleneck(s) by mapping the systems around them and identifying things like:

• What other systems or processes might contribute to this bottleneck?
• What other systems or processes may be affected by this bottleneck?
• What flows through this part of the system (e.g., people, aircraft, baggage, information)?
• What resources are needed and possibly shared with other systems (e.g., staff, space, equipment, time)?
• What varies the most during peak periods?

Once again, you might need to do some calculations and make some assumptions.

• What other parts of the airport system does this bottleneck affect?
• If this bottleneck is improved, what new problem(s) might appear?
• What trade-offs are inherent in this part of the airport process (e.g., cost vs speed, space vs flexibility, security vs flow)?

• What are the three most important assumptions you are making, the assumptions that, if they are wrong, will have the greatest effect?
• What would you want to test or measure if you could ? These might form an important part of your final set of recommendations. When engineers are uncertain about something, they make this very clear.
• How could your assumptions impact other areas, structures, and flows in the airport?

Based on your analysis of the existing bottleneck(s), what kind of interventions seem most promising? Indicate whether you believe your proposal serves as a short-term stabilization only or as a long-term capacity solution as well. This is another point at which doing some calculations would be helpful.

For example, if you think adding new passport control lanes would be helpful, do the calculations that demonstrate what quantitative effect this will have. Check the Assumption bank including the section on Operational improvements to make sure that your proposals are grounded in reality.

Here are some examples of the kinds of changes you could propose, but it is certainly not all of them.

• A layout change
• A process change
• A scheduling / operations change
• An information / communication change
• A combination of the above

Remember, you must be able to justify whatever design proposal(s) you make, again making sure that all your assumptions are explicit and reasonable.

What specific performance improvements can your design proposal(s) be expected to deliver? Do the calculations so that you can convince the CEO that your proposals will work. Some examples include:

• Passengers per hour
• Average wait time
• Aircraft turnaround time
• Reliability under peak load
• Accessibility and inclusivity

If you have not yet done this, explicitly examine whether your design proposal(s) is(are) sufficient to also meet expected future demand. You will probably need to do some calculations based on the passenger and aircraft demand estimates provided. For example, if peak demand rises at the same percentage as overall passengers, how would your proposals cope with this new demand?

If not, what additional proposals could you make? What other bottleneck(s) are likely to emerge that will need to be addressed in the future?

There is no set format for your presentation. You can create a PowerPoint presentation or other document if you wish. The most important thing is that you justify your proposals. This means you need to explain your thinking and describe how and why you arrived at your conclusions, including making all your assumptions explicit. For the CEO to take your recommendations seriously, they need to understand why you are making them and why they make sense.

Here is a helpful checklist you can use to make sure that your presentation is as complete as possible:

• Have you identified at least one primary bottleneck?
• Are you able to justify your choice of bottleneck to focus on?
• Have you included at least 4 – 5 relevant calculations based on the data provided?
• Are all your assumptions explicit and are they reasonable and justified?
• Where you have opted for very optimistic assumptions have you acknowledged the inherent trade-offs?
• Have you explicitly tested the effects of your assumptions and identified when or where they might fail?
• Have you compared conservative/reliable operations with optimized/fragile operations?
• Have you recognized at least one trade-off or secondary effect of your proposals?
• Have you identified any possible or emerging secondary bottlenecks or knock-on effects?
• Have you done a future capacity check?
• Have you acknowledged where your design proposals alone may not meet 2034 demand?
• Have you made next-step recommendations?

You have 5 – 10 minutes to present your recommendations. Thereafter, the CEO is likely going to want to ask you some questions and have you explain in more detail how you arrived at these conclusions.

It is important that everyone on your team participates in the presentation.