Search

Over the past years, aviation policies are more and more focussed on sustainability rather than connectivity, putting pressure on airlines to re-design the network. For this, evaluating air travellers their preferences on direct routing compared to lay-overs is needed to make well-informed design choices. This paper examines the preferences of air travellers on direct itineraries by applying a data-driven approach. To this end, a stated preference choice experiment is developed and implemented in an online survey. The results of the latent class choice model show two types of flyers with different preferences, labelled as time sensitive and price sensitive flyers. The model outcomes indicate that both are willing to pay for direct itineraries, while time sensitive flyers are willing to pay substantially more. Other flight characteristics also play an important role in air travellers’ route choice, such as the distance to the airport, travel time, and transfer time. Travel motive, ticket price compensation by the employer, and experience with layovers drive whether air travellers belong to the time or price sensitive flyers. The distinction between time and price sensitive flyers and their preferences is expected to yield more tailored transport policies than a distinction between, for instance, business and non-business. Future research should focus on the societal impact of a reduction in direct itineraries for air travellers, using insights gained in this study.

Several previous studies have explored air travellers’ willingness to compensate for their aviation carbon emissions or their willingness to pay for voluntary carbon offsetting programs. These studies have concluded that it is important to educate air travellers about the negative impacts of aviation on the environment. This study proposes two types of communication media and measures their effects on passengers’ knowledge about the environmental impacts of aviation. Then, travellers’ attitudes toward carbon offsetting and their willingness to offset their flights or change their travel behaviour are measured. Finally, a path model is estimated to analyse the effects of the various sources of knowledge on travellers’ knowledge about aviation and the environment, their attitudes toward the environmental impacts of aviation and their willingness to mitigate these impacts. The outcomes suggest that appropriate media could be adopted to enhance passengers’ knowledge of aviation impacts and the benefits of carbon offset programs, which could help passengers develop positive attitudes toward carbon offsetting and be more willing to offset their flights and change their travel behaviour. Not only does this study verify the relationships among knowledge, attitude, and behaviour (intention), it also has implications beyond academic research: it demonstrates that environmental education for air travellers should be prioritized. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the impact of limited airport capacity on the airport choice of individual air travellers. The quantitative analysis is based on a nested logit model, enhanced to allow for capacity constraints at airports and to improve model applicability in the real world. The paper starts by describing the main idea of the model and goes on to consider airport choice behaviour in the Cologne region in a capacity-constrained decentralised airport environment. To elaborate the impact of limited airport capacity on passenger choice, three different scenarios are analysed. In this manner it is possible to illustrate the complex distributional changes in airport choice by market segment, trip origin and trip destination. This research aims to show the mutual dependence among airports operating in a decentralised environment in which some airports do not have the capacity to meet their full demand potential. In such an environment, capacity constraints at one airport may lead to spill-over effects and thus influence air travel demand served elsewhere. In some cases, this may even lead to new capacity constraints at these airports. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: The influenza A virus is easily transmitted through airborne saliva droplets disseminated by unprotected coughing or sneezing, particularly in a crowded, enclosed space., Aim: The purpose of this study was to analyse the knowledge, attitudes and practices of air travellers regarding influenza A preventive measures and to examine any significant differences in perceptions among different types of traveller groups., Methods: This study used a 5-point Likert scale questionnaire and surveyed 1684 passengers at Taoyuan International Airport in Taiwan. The frequencies, mean score and ranking of descriptive analyses were used to evaluate respondents' demographic profiles. t-Test, one-way analysis of variance and Scheffe post hoc analyses were used to evaluate the relationship among knowledge, attitudes and practices, and respondents' characteristics., Results: There were significant differences in the knowledge, attitudes and practices measures among groups with different types of trip purposes and among occupation groups. Most passengers expressed common knowledge regarding influenza A; however, their attitudes and their degree of perception were not consistent with their prevention practices., Limitations: This research is limited because it only examined surveyed air travellers in Taiwan., Conclusion: Air travellers could benefit greatly if the government and airlines were to implement a health policy that includes education on the importance of influenza prevention measures, such as frequent hand washing, to citizens. Nurses could be involved in this important health promotion activity., Implications for Nursing and Health Policy: Schools should implement a health education policy to communicate the importance of prevention measures. Nurses can consider how they can be involved in emphasizing the importance of prevention and health promotion regarding this. Airlines should also include basic preventive measures as a component of flight attendant training., (© 2014 International Council of Nurses.)