Big data set to land better experience for passengers

GOLD Coast Airport plans to use big data to provide a more efficient experience for its sixmillion-plus annual passengers.

The airport is teaming with Bond University to use the power of big data to predict the number of travellers using the Coolangatta terminal.

Minute-by-minute forecasts of passenger numbers at Australia’s sixth busiest airport would allow, for example, more baggage handlers and security staff to be rostered on at peak times.

Associate Professor of Statistics at Bond Business School, Dr Adrian Gepp, said the project would provide predictions up to three months ahead.

“The airport already knows that next year they are going to have roughly ‘X’ number of passengers, but how many of those are going to rock up in the next seven days?” he said.

“Will there be 1000 people at the airport in an hour? How many will there be an hour after that? We hope to provide those answers.”

Dr Gepp said it was hoped to have an operational system in use by early next year.

The program will import scheduled flight traffic and crunch airport data stretching back to 2011. However, it will delve much deeper.

“We’ll be looking at coming events on the Gold Coast but also major events in Sydney and Melbourne because we’re looking at outbound traffic as well as inbound,” Dr Gepp said.

“And we’ve grabbed school holiday dates from the eastern seaboard back until 2011.”

The program will also monitor fare discounting that could lead to spikes in the number of passengers using the airport and even how many people were googling key words associated with the Gold Coast.

“If lots of people are online searching for ‘Gold Coast’ and then a month later there is a big peak in traffic we will use that as a predictor in future,” Dr Gepp said.

The work is being funded by Gold Coast Airport operator Queensland Airports Limited and the Federal Government through an Innovation Connections Grant.