Airspace [ASE]

Owned by Manfred Beckmann
Last updated: 2022 Sept 23 by georgiana.andrei04

Purpose & Scope

This page and its child pages contain the coding guidelines for the minimum and conditional data for the airspace subjects as defined in PANS-AIM, for both ATS Airspace and Special activity airspace.

In the PANS-AIM Aeronautical Data Catalogue, ATS airspace is defined as follows:

Airspaces of defined dimensions, alphabetically designated, within which specific types of flights may operate and for which air traffic services and rules of operation are specified

PANS-AIM lists the following types of ATS airspaces:

  • FIR/UIR
  • CTA
  • TMA
  • CTR

AIP context

In an AIP, all of these types of airspaces are published in section ENR 2.1, except CTR which is published in AD 2.17. You may also find other types of airspaces published in these sections of an AIP ( e.g. OCA, UTA, ATZ, etc.), which are not listed in PANS-AIM.

PANS-AIM does not define Special activity airspace but is does list a set of airspace types that are considered Special activity airspaces in the Aeronautical Data Catalogue:

  • Prohibited Area
  • Restricted Area
  • Danger Area
  • Military Exercise Area
  • Military Training Area
  • Air Defence Identification Zone (ADIZ)
  • Other

In the PANS-AIM Aeronautical Data Catalogue also properties for 'Aerial sporting activities airspace' and 'Other regulated airspace' are defined.

AIP context

In an AIP, these types of airspaces (and other types) are published in the following sections:

  • ENR 5.1 Prohibited, restricted and danger areas

  • ENR 5.2 Military exercise and training areas and air defence identification zone (ADIZ)

  • ENR 5.3.1 Other activities of a dangerous nature
  • ENR 5.3.2 Other regulated airspaces
  • ENR 5.5 Aerial sporting and recreational activities

AIXM Model Overview

The figure below shows the main AIXM 5 classes used for the airspace concept.

The main class in this AIXM model is the Airspace class containing the basic data, such as the name and type of the airspace.

There are two main ways to describe the geometry of airspace volumes in AIXM 5:

  • by providing a horizontal projection with vertical limits;
  • by providing a composition rule by which the airspace is defined as a series of unions, intersections, subtractions of other airspace(s).

For the first option, the AirspaceVolume class with a related Surface or Curve (for airspace corridors) will be used for the encoding.

For the second option, the airspace composition will be encoded by using the AirspaceGeometryComponent class and if applicable (in case of airspace aggregation by reference) also the AirspaceVolumeDependency class.

The class of an airspace is encoded using the AirspaceLayer object. An airspace class may be defined for the whole airspace or layers of it.

Furthermore, within an airspace a Service may be provided by a Unit using one or more RadioCommunicationChannel.

Airspaces and the service provided by the ATS unit may operate under certain schedules.

For special activity airspaces, also information about the existing type of restriction or nature of hazard, activation process and/or time of activity may be provided using the AirspaceActivation class.

AIXM 5.2 Improvements

A change proposal (AIXM-391) for the next AIXM 5.2 version has been approved by the AIXM Change Control Board, through which the data type TextNameBaseType is modified, allowing also the use of lowercase characters.

The coding guidelines provided here are aligned with forward/backward conversion rules contained in the AIXM-391 Change Proposal.

Coding Examples

The figure below shows a simple example of a restricted area with the designator EAR7.


More coding examples can be found in the AIP Data Set - Specimen (DONLON).

No.DescriptionXPath Expression
ASE-EX-01ATS airspace, FIR//aixm:AirspaceTimeSlice[@gml:id='ASE_AMSWELL_FIR']
ASE-EX-02ATS airspace, TMA//aixm:AirspaceTimeSlice[@gml:id='ASE_NIBORD_TMA']
ASE-EX-03Special activity airspace,  Prohibited Area, Circle

//aixm:AirspaceTimeSlice[@gml:id='ASE_VAARDNOR_P']

ASE-EX-04Special activity airspace,  Restricted Area, Arc segment (Arc by centrepoint)//aixm:AirspaceTimeSlice[@gml:id='ASE_BRAVO_R']
ASE-EX-05Special activity airspace,  Restricted Area, Rectangle//aixm:AirspaceTimeSlice[@gml:id='ASE_BURGENVALK_R']
ASE-EX-06Special activity airspace,  Restricted Area, reference to state boundary (annotation)//aixm:AirspaceTimeSlice[@gml:id='ASE_WINSWUK_R']
ASE-EX-07Special activity airspace, Local type, reference to state boundary (xlink:href)//aixm:AirspaceTimeSlice[@gml:id='ASE_EAMOA01_MOA']
ASE-EX-08Special activity airspace,  Danger Area, Active weekday schedules//aixm:AirspaceTimeSlice[@gml:id='ASE_HORSHAM_D']
ASE-EX-09Special activity airspace,  Danger Area, within CTR//aixm:AirspaceTimeSlice[@gml:id='ASE_DONLON_D']
ASE-EX-10Airspace Corridor, Alert Area//aixm:AirspaceTimeSlice[@gml:id='ASE_ACR001_A']

ASE-EX-11

ASE-EX-12

ASE-EX-13

ATS airspace, CTA (Airspace aggregation by copying the geometry), Union of two airspace components

//aixm:AirspaceTimeSlice[@gml:id='ASE_DONLON_CTA'] |

/aixm:AirspaceTimeSlice[@gml:id='ASE_DONLON1_CTA_P'] |

/aixm:AirspaceTimeSlice[@gml:id='ASE_DONLON2_CTA_P']

ASE-EX-14

ASE-EX-15

ASE-EX-16		ATS airspace, TMA,  (Airspace aggregation by referencing), Union of two parts

//aixm:AirspaceTimeSlice[@gml:id='ASE_MAGNETTO_TMA'] |

//aixm:AirspaceTimeSlice[@gml:id='ASE_MAGNETTO1_TMA_P'] |

//aixm:AirspaceTimeSlice[@gml:id='ASE_MAGNETTO2_TMA_P']
ASE-EX-17ATS airspace, CTR (Point reference using aixm:Point annotations)//aixm:AirspaceTimeSlice[@gml:id='ASE_DONLON_CTR']

ASE-EX-18

DPN-EX-06

ATS airspace, ATZ (Point reference, Using xlink:href)

//aixm:AirspaceTimeSlice[@gml:id='ASE_DONLON_ATZ'] |

//aixm:DesignatedPointTimeSlice[@gml:id='DPN_EADH'] |

ASE-EX-19Aerial sporting activities airspace//aixm:AirspaceTimeSlice[@gml:id='ASE_DONBURG_PARACHUTE_JUMPING_AERA']

Child Pages