The almost ceaselessly growing Air Transportation System has led to concerns across airports on how to deal with this growth. Also Amsterdam Airport Schiphol (AAS) experienced large increases in number of passengers and movements over the last decades: the current limit of 500,000 annual movements of the airport is (nearly) reached. Before stretching the current limit, AAS shall demonstrate that its growth is safely possible. In the past, both Hillestad et al. (1993) and the Dutch Safety Board (2017) investigated the safety at AAS and concluded that, despite vulnerabilities, the airport was safe.
This research explores challenges and opportunities towards improving airport taxiway systems. Therefore, a currently lacking definition for taxiway system at systems level is defined first. Besides, Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) for taxiway systems are defined in order to identify parameters for improving the system based on stakeholders' point of views: safety, capacity, robustness, and environmental impact. Also, methods for assessing taxiway systems on these identified KPIs are defined. Next, AAS is used as a case study to analyze the performance of the taxiway system at the airport on the defined safety KPI. As part of the safety analysis of AAS, for the first time a taxiway system was analyzed on the Sustainable Safety vision as developed for road traffic - and showed to be valuable. Based on the safety analysis, challenges and opportunities within the taxiway system are identified and recommendations provided.