The increasing demand on the air transportation system is causing delays due to congestion, leading to monetary losses and passenger inconvenience. Traditionally, research has been conducted to improve the airside component of the airport. This led to improvements in the airside component in tum leading to increased demand. The landside was not considered as a serious threat to the capacity of the airport. However, the increased demand and inconsistent improvements to the landside has made this airport component critical at some facilities.

Research in recent years has produced many methods to assess landside capacity and to predict the behavior of the system under different demand scenarios. Many of these tools are cumbersome and are not suitable for every day use of planning professionals. This research is aimed at developing a computer based simulation model (ALPS) to estimate or predict the capacity of the landside components under varying scenarios.

ALPS is a discrete-event simulation model developed using EXTEND (version 2 © Imagine That inc., 1992) a simulation software based on the 'C' programming language. This model is designed to be able to simulate a given airport in a short time with accurate results. The model runs on a Apple Macintosh computer and needs no special programming for effective use. The model is well suited for every day use of planning professionals.