PC. Multi level runways at airports?

WILDGEESE

Gone Fishin'
With all the aggro etc about building a 3rd runway at Heathrow Airport got me having a crazy idea.

How about instead of building more runways, across from each other, the runways themselves were built on top of each other, multi-storey car park style with a slip road down to ground level from each runway.

I was thinking of each level being 500 ft above the last one and being 1,000 ft across to aid clearance and take off and landing of the biggest jets especially now with all landing devices afforded to passenger jets, that they could land themselves.

Crazy idea I know, so would it work?

Regards filers
 
Seems like it would incur way too much extra cost for a rather distressing additional risk of disaster. All it would take is one accident and no more multi-level runways are built and all remaining ones closed (or just the top level used).
 
Build the top deck wider (up to the full width of the airport?), to get rid of the over-the-edge problem, and use it only for landings, and use the lower deck just for take-offs? Difference in height between decks doesn't have to be as much. Crash barriers to stop landing aircraft running off the upper deck?
 
There's also the issue of the tower's view of the runways - how would they see the lower deck in order to safely control the movement of aircraft?
 
With all the aggro etc about building a 3rd runway at Heathrow Airport got me having a crazy idea.

How about instead of building more runways, across from each other, the runways themselves were built on top of each other, multi-storey car park style with a slip road down to ground level from each runway.


Crazy idea I know, so would it work?

Regards filers

Ahahahahaha... Hell no. The problem is that for one, you're asking someone to fly into an enclosed space. This was semi-feasible with barnstormers, and that was about it. For a modern commercial jet this is a death sentence. For two, it completely removes the pilot's ability to abort a landing. Pilots need to be able to nose up and slam the throttles to the stops at any point so that if a landing goes wrong, they can retry. With your proposed dimensions, the pilot would have to carefully control his abort pull-out, which if a commercial airliner is aborting isn't going to happen. Third, structurally it would be next to impossible to build at your proposed scale.
 
The only way I can see anything close to this being plausible was if all aircraft had VTOL or hovering capabilities similar to vehicles seen in sci-fi genres like Star Wars. Given today's technology for aircraft, it would be too expensive to build and be able to withstand the weight of multiple passenger jets, not to mention so sane pilot would want to even attempt it in the first place. Even if you did find pilots daring enough, one crash could bring down the whole structure.
 
Plausible? Hell no.

On the other hand, I have heard of something even madder. It's off the net at the moment, but once Tales of Future Past comes back online, server issues willing, you will be able to find the inspiringly psychomaniacal tale of the Paris strategic aerodrome proposed in 1925.

It attempts to overcome the issue of time to altitude, remember we're not long after WWI here, by starting them off at height...The basic design was a giant tapering concrete spire twenty-five thousand feet tall, three thousand across the base, with shelves built off the central core for air stations at five thousand foot intervals; you could probably have fitted half the twenties Armee de'l Air on it.

Of course as the planes got larger and more powerful, the landing decks would have to be extended, and the core reinforced- I wonder if this is how WH40K hive cities start out?

Also, as megalithic as it would have been, it would probably actually have been more use than the Maginot Line...
 
I was thinking of each level being 500 ft above the last one and being 1,000 ft across to aid clearance and take off and landing

Won't this result in some very exciting turbulence as wind blows across the structure? Possibly also do interesting things to ground effect and thermals.
 
Plausible? Hell no.

On the other hand, I have heard of something even madder. It's off the net at the moment, but once Tales of Future Past comes back online, server issues willing, you will be able to find the inspiringly psychomaniacal tale of the Paris strategic aerodrome proposed in 1925.

It attempts to overcome the issue of time to altitude, remember we're not long after WWI here, by starting them off at height...The basic design was a giant tapering concrete spire twenty-five thousand feet tall, three thousand across the base, with shelves built off the central core for air stations at five thousand foot intervals; you could probably have fitted half the twenties Armee de'l Air on it.

Of course as the planes got larger and more powerful, the landing decks would have to be extended, and the core reinforced- I wonder if this is how WH40K hive cities start out?

Also, as megalithic as it would have been, it would probably actually have been more use than the Maginot Line...

LOL! And here I though damning Gibralter was a totally bat shit idea. That seems sane and rational compared to this.
 

Delta Force

Banned
Didn't some early aircraft carriers have multiple decks, with the lower one for launching and the upper one for recovery? I think the lower decks were considered unsafe even in that limited role.
 
Airliners could only land on the upper deck ... because they need clear airspace to abort poor approaches.

The lower deck would only be used for takeoff, but you would probably want to limit lateral and vertical movement until the airplane reaches the exit aperture (hatch). The best way to limit movement is to keep the nosewheel attached to a catapult shuttle until it reaches the hatch(departure end of lower runway.)
 
Didn't some early aircraft carriers have multiple decks, with the lower one for launching and the upper one for recovery? I think the lower decks were considered unsafe even in that limited role.

Several early carriers were built with a lower fly-off only deck. I do not remember safety being an issue with abandoning the concept. My memory is that there was an issue with storm-damage from the lower bow design and operational complexities that didn't seem worth it for the increased launching frequencies...especially once the management of the main flight-deck was more evolved and quicker anyway.

Tim
 
Several early carriers were built with a lower fly-off only deck. I do not remember safety being an issue with abandoning the concept. My memory is that there was an issue with storm-damage from the lower bow design and operational complexities that didn't seem worth it for the increased launching frequencies...especially once the management of the main flight-deck was more evolved and quicker anyway.
I don't know about damage. I think achievable speeds off the lower decks was more the concern--they were short enough that heavier aircraft couldn't achieve flying speed before leaving the end of them. IIRC, by even the mid-30s, many of the ships that had multi-level flight decks were being re-examined. Kaga and Akagi both underwent rebuilds starting in 1934 and 1935, respectively.
 
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