In real life airports spend a lot of money to optimize its operations through the use of software and by training their staff to become better at what they do.
Why it should be implemented:
It adds a level of detail and allows a CEO to improve their operations by investing in their IT infrastructure and into their staff.
I get where you are coming from and it would defintely add another layer to the realism of Airport CEO, but imo at the current stage of ACEO it is more important to implement all “basic” features of airport operations before turning towards something more detailed as your proposal seams to be.
Absolutely agree with you. That’s the reason why I put it here. If the community wants this feature sooner than later, they will vote for it. If not, they won’t
Having played the game now for +/- 40 hours, I realized some concrete examples where a software module would help a CEO improving his/her airport while at the same time adding an additional level of costs and complexity.
This is a somewhat longer message, so I tried to format it as good as possible so that you can read it in stages .
Procurement of Software Modules
Software should be sold similar to the baggage screening options. Initially you would have to procure a basic software license that would give you the ability to create a new room (e.g. IT department). Afterwards you have additional modules for the software that the CEO can procure one-by-one and then install a separate Machine or Desk in the IT department. I know that this is kind of a weird solution as nowadays we no longer have mainframes, but I like the method how the baggage screening system is created in the ACEO.
Software Modules
Staff planning module: Without any software installed, staff would behave as it does today and sometimes comes late to a check-in or boarding desk or security staff leaves a security gate without the new crew already being in place. In addition nowadays it often happens that a ramp agent works on a stand on the lower left corner of the terminal and the next task is on the upper right corner of the terminal. Very inefficient.
With the module installed a CEO is able to allocate staff to certain zones in the airport and the system will make sure that staff is only assigned tasks that are within this zone. In addition staff would have a X% higher probability to arrive at an assigned task on time.
One more functionality, but not sure if this goes too far, is that the CEO could manage how many minutes before a task is supposed to start a staff member should be on site. This way you could for example build boarding areas for large aircraft with two boarding gates and via the module you can make sure that staff is on site at least 20 (game) minutes before boarding actually starts, so to make sure that boarding will start on time.
GSE planning module: Comparable to the staff planning module. Improves usability and effectiveness of GSE (ground support equipment).
Hub Management module: This system is used by the CEO to keep track of each and every turnaround in one screen. We already have this screen today, but this should only be the basic view. With this module the CEO would get the ability to expedite certain tasks directly via this GUI in order to speed-up the turnaround of important flights. As an example the CEO could order a second fuel truck to speed-up fueling, or allocate a emergency ramp agent team to speed-up loading, etc.
In addition this system could be used for a potential future functionality of connections of passengers and baggage, like seeing which passengers connects from which flight to another flight.
Advanced Auto Flight Scheduler module: There is already another feature request regarding an updated Flight Scheduler. It could also become an additional software module that offers more functionality than the standard Auto Flight Scheduler
Financial Planning module: This module can be used to receive much more details about your financial situation (P&L analysis, financial overview of airline contracts, financial overview of shop/restaurant contracts, cost overview of staff, etc.).
Running Costs of Software
What I realised is that at a certain point it is way too easy to make money. Normally once you openend two/three shops and a restaurant, making money is a no-brainer. There is also no further complexity once you mastered the advanced baggage screening part.
Therefore my idea is to make the running cost of the software modules related to the number of passengers that were in the airport in the last hour. This way, the larger your airport gets, the more you have to pay for your software. It could be something like 5 EUR / 10 Pax per module.
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