Understanding the impact of aircraft speed heterogeneity on air traffic operation is crucial for airspace design and air traffic flow management. Speed heterogeneity (or aircraft mix) is recognized as a causal factor for complexity in air traffic operations, through qualitative or statistical analysis. Quantitative metrics on how it affects current and future Trajectory-Based Operation (TBO) is lacking, however. In this paper, we present an in-depth investigation of the impact of speed heterogeneity, by defining air traffic robustness at microscopic (aircraft pair) and macroscopic (air traffic flow) levels in nominal situations, derived mathematically and validated through fast-time computer simulations. A human-in-the-loop study follows investigating six 4D en route operation scenarios, where operators were instructed to resolve a large disturbance in a sector, using a novel interface. Results confirm the negative impact of speed heterogeneity on air traffic controller performance in terms of flow efficiency and workload. The mechanism of such impact is substantiated through analyzing several speed-based robustness metrics. Although the simulated traffic scenarios have similar baseline robustness, those with mixed speeds lead to significantly lower robustness and operational performance. This emphasizes the need to incorporate speed heterogeneity in robustness evaluations of air traffic control in current and future TBO environments.

了解飞机速度异质性对空中交通运营的影响对于空域设计和空中交通流量管理至关重要。通过定性或统计分析，速度异质性（或飞机混合）被认为是造成空中交通运营复杂性的原因。但是，缺乏关于其如何影响当前和未来基于轨迹的操作（TBO）的定量指标。在本文中，我们通过定义名义情况下微观（飞机对）和宏观（空中交通流量）级别的空中交通运输稳健性，对速度异质性的影响进行了深入研究，通过数学方法得出并通过快速计算机进行了验证模拟。在环人研究之后，我们调查了六个4D航路操作场景，指导操作员使用新颖的界面解决扇区中的较大干扰。结果证实了速度异质性对空中交通管制员性能的负面影响，包括流量效率和工作量。通过分析几个基于速度的鲁棒性指标，可以证实这种影响的机制。尽管模拟的交通场景具有相似的基线鲁棒性，但那些混合速度的场景会导致鲁棒性和运营性能大大降低。这强调了将速度异质性纳入当前和未来TBO环境中的空中交通管制稳健性评估的必要性。通过分析几个基于速度的鲁棒性指标，可以证实这种影响的机制。尽管模拟的交通场景具有相似的基线鲁棒性，但那些混合速度的场景会导致鲁棒性和运营性能大大降低。这强调了将速度异质性纳入当前和未来TBO环境中的空中交通管制稳健性评估的必要性。通过分析几个基于速度的鲁棒性指标，可以证实这种影响的机制。尽管模拟的交通场景具有相似的基线鲁棒性，但那些混合速度的场景会导致鲁棒性和运营性能大大降低。这强调了将速度异质性纳入当前和未来TBO环境中的空中交通管制稳健性评估的必要性。