traffic musings: Building a better traffic mousetrap

[mnmon 0]

I usually take at least 15 minutes to get going in the PMDG or MD80, but in places like Newark even then you will see many go arounds and planes trying to land on top of each other. It really should be a relatively easy fix for MS to do. Mike

[ronzie 21]

To reduce the take-off queue I run AI Smooth 1.12. By increasing the spacing of arrivals some ten seconds (up from 30) it lets departures squeeze in.I have adjusted using Ken Salter's FS Configurator the taxi speed of AI up slightly.Finally at the high density airports I use the cross runway PAI AFCADs and others when available. This is the work around that lets you have cross runways simultaneously active. I use Radar Contact for ATC which unlike FS ATC does not see the short psuedo runways in its runway choice lists.Don't forget that when assigning runways exclusively for take-off or departure that the properties for both ends of each must match according to various folks.

[Guest CowlFlapsOpen]

terrific ideas for balancing AI load. My original idea, to avoid it being lost, was that users be able to specify a ceiling on how many AI are actually represented in the effective local area surrounding the plane, and thus more precisely govern how heavily the cpu is taxed by creating and managing traffic. The native method of managing this by using the density slider only works if only the default .bgl is used (because apparently it was generated with a more or less constant number of flight plans at each percentage level). Once one begins adding or editing traffic, the slider becomes very inexact and even misleading.AI and ATC are not targeted for much improvement in FSX (MS assumes we would prefer the option to fly loops through imaginary red circles in the sky while racing against the clock) but MS has expressed a greater interest than ever before in growing the add on market for FS, as I understand it. With even a small change in how density of AI is governed they could really smooth things for folks who want to keep adding and tweaking AI. Real world airlines and AI flioght plans is a very gratifying way to enhance the emersion of the sim. Perhaps it is not too late for MS to consider this idea.