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Airports
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Airports have two capacities - one for groundside and one for airside. Groundside capacity is the number of passengers per year the airport's roads, parking lots and terminals can handle. Airside capacity, on the other hand, is the number of aircraft operations the airport's runways, taxiways and gates can accommodate safely.
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Airports are divided into landside and airside areas. Landside areas include parking lots, public transportation train stations, tank farms and access roads. Airside areas include all areas accessible to aircraft, including runways, taxiways, ramps and tank farms. Access from landside areas to airside areas is tightly controlled at most airports. Passengers on commercial flights access airside areas through terminals, where they can purchase tickets, clear security, check or claim luggage and board aircraft through gates. The waiting areas which provide passenger access to aircraft are typically called concourses, although this term is often used interchangeably with terminal.
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Airlines and Airports do not appear impressed with US Government plans to use landing fees to help ease congestion on major US air travel routes. Landing fees are paid by airlines to airports and the proposal is to raise the landing fees during peak times in an effort to move more flight traffic to off peak.
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Compared to December 2006, domestic terminal passenger traffic in December 2007 registered a net increase of 197.4 thousand passengers driven by growth in passenger traffic at 10 of the Company's airports. It is worth noting the growth at the airports of Guadalajara with 65.0 thousand passengers; Tijuana with 43.8 thousand passengers; Los Cabos with 29.7 thousand passengers; Puerto Vallarta with 22.8 thousand passengers; Hermosillo with 13.9 thousand passengers, Mexicali with 9.6 thousand passengers and Aguascalientes with 9.1 thousand passengers. These airports represented 99.6% of the total increase. The increases continue to be largely attributable to the routes operated by the low-cost carriers (LCC's), such as Interjet, Volaris, Alma, Click, VivaAerobus and Avolar.
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Some airports, typically military airbases, have long runways used as emergency landing sites. Many airbases have arresting equipment for fast aircraft, known as Rotary Hydraulic Arrester Gear - a strong cable suspended just above the runway and attached to a hydraulic reduction gear mechanism. Together with the landing aircraft's arresting hook, it is used in situations where the brakes would have little or no effect.
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