Challenging our digital tower assumptions

Digital control towers: what was once a concept, confined to a niche of the industry, is now an operational reality for a growing number of airports around the world…

From London to Singapore via Budapest and Colorado, airports of all sizes and types are either going ‘digital’ or preparing trials to do so.

These are the pathfinders; the pioneer airports willing to step forward and lean into the light of a new world, and there is no doubt that great work is being done. But while we may still be at the fledging stages of this new era, our partnership with Searidge Technologies has given us the opportunity to question the perceived wisdom that has already taken root in some parts of the industry.

The idea that a digital tower means you should simply look to recreate exactly what a controller would see out of a traditional visual control room, seems to me to be forcing constraints on the technology that don’t need to exist.

This technology is revolutionary, so why only recreate what we already have?