DFW International Airport Skylink System

Thanks to the hard work of the DFW Airport Development Team, passengers at Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport (DFW) are now celebrating the arrival of a “new star” - the new Skylink inter-terminal transit system. Skylink embodies the best ideas in automated people mover (APM) design from Lea+Elliott, the system designer, and also the newest system technology offered by Bombardier Transportation, the system supplier.
 

Lea+Elliott has been involved with Skylink from its
conception. As part of DFW’s engineering/architectural team, Lea+Elliott performed all phases of the system’s planning and implementation, including: feasibility studies, preliminary engineering of system and guideway, procurement and evaluation, and management of system implementation. In designing Skylink, Lea+Elliott incorporated best practices for APM systems, gleaned from 25 years of firm  experience. Noteworthy features of the design include:

• a full dual-loop guideway, that is “fail soft” because of its redundancy;

• no revenue service switching for high reliability and service availability;

• switches and crossovers for failure management;

• a fully-automatic maintenance yard (23 automated routes) under the separate control of a maintenance controller;

• a system simulator that is capable of mimicking full system operation for training purposes;

• system stations that are fully integrated into the existing
  terminals, so passengers do not have to pass through security when using Skylink;

• an elevated system guideway (25,000 ft. dual-lane) that
  incorporated precast columns and beams to speed
  construction;

• exceptional passenger service - the maximum passenger trip time is nine minutes and the average passenger trip time is five minutes;

• high system capacity - 5,000 passengers per hour per
  direction (pphpd), expandable to 8,500 pphpd; and

• the operation of Skylink will be a joint endeavor of DFW
  personnel and Bombardier. DFW will operate the system and Bombardier will maintain it under contract to DFW.

In addition to the above conceptual features, many technology advances were incorporated into Skylink by Bombardier. These include:

• a totally new vehicle technology, named Innovia, for the 64 vehicles;

• 42 new guidebeam switches for failure management and maintenance purposes; and

• a totally new, communications-based train control system called Citiflo650 that relies exclusively on computers for train guidance and safety. Skylink trains will operate at speeds up to 37 mph and at operational headways of 100 seconds.

There is no question that Skylink represents the latest thinking and newest technologies for airport APMs. Lea+Elliott is proud to have contributed to Skylink’s success and congratulates the DFW Airport Development Team on their vision to construct the world’s most advanced airport APM system.
 

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