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Developing a quality index for US airports

Article  in  Journal of Service Theory and Practice · August 2000

DOI: 10.1108/09604520010373136

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Research and concepts
Developing a quality
index for US airports
Dawna L. Rhoades
Blaise Waguespack Jr and
Seth Young
The authors
Dawna L. Rhoades, Blaise Waguespack Jr and Seth
Young are all Assistant Professors at the Embry-Riddle
Aeronautical University, Daytona Beach, Florida, USA.
Keywords
Airports, Service quality, USA
Abstract
This paper addresses efforts to design a quantitative
index of characteristics and factors that comprise quality
in airport facilities and operations from the perspective of
all airport service customers including airlines, airport
tenants, airport service operators, and consumers of
airline and air cargo operations. The results of an initial
survey of airport directors and consultants have identified
12 broad factors that, in their view, most affect the
quality of airport operations. These factors include
parking, capacity, ground transportation, shopping and
restaurant services, and waiting area considerations.
Electronic access
The research register for this journal is available at
http://www.mcbup.com/research_registers/
quality.asp
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is
available at
http://www.emerald-library.com
Managing Service Quality
Volume 10 . Number 4 . 2000 . pp. 257±262
# MCB University Press . ISSN 0960-4529
257
Introduction
Over 3.2 million passengers pass through US
airports each day. By the year 2009, total US
scheduled passenger enplanements per year
are expected to reach one billion. In addition,
the number of international visitors is
expected to double to 100 million. These
figures on passenger traffic represent a rise of
almost 60 percent (Kansas City Star, 2000). It
is estimated that US airports create US$380
billion a year in economic activity. This
includes 1.6 million jobs on airport property
itself and another 4.2 million in local US
communities. The vast majority of these
benefits and jobs center on the 30 largest US
airports, the so-called (large) hub airports
(ACI, 1999). In fact, almost 90 percent of US
passengers travel between the largest 75
airports (Barclay, 1997).
It is also estimated that US airports will
require an investment of approximately
US$60 billion over the next six years in
capital development projects such as runways,
terminals, access roads, safety and security,
and noise mitigation in order to meet future
demands (ACI, 1999). Unfortunately, the
trend has been heading in the wrong
direction; the USA has invested less in public
infrastructure over the past 25 years than any
other G-7 nation (Thurow, 1996). After
months of wrangling, the US Congress has
passed a US$40 billion bill to fund aviation
programs over the next three years, much of it
targeted at airports and air traffic control
systems. The bill also approved an increase in
the passenger facility charges (PFCs) that can
be levied by individual airports to raise funds.
Airports, consumers, and policy makers
must now deal with the questions of how,
where, and on what the money is to be spent.
The different groups must select the airports
that will receive funding and determine when
and on what the money will be spent. While
individual airports may conduct research on
service quality issues specific to their airport
and various transportation and travel industry
groups may issue consumer-polled rankings
of airport facilities, there has been little
attempt to develop a quantitative index of
characteristics and factors that comprise
quality in airport facilities and operations.
This paper discusses our efforts to develop
This research was funded by a grant from the
Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University, Florida,
USA.
 Developing a quality index for US airports
Dawna L. Rhoades, Blaise Waguespack Jr and Seth Young
such an index based on input from industry
experts and airport operators. Our goal is to
derive an integrated, normalized, and
unbiased customer- and operator-based
airport quality index.
Benchmarking airports
The largest qualitative effort to examine
airport quality is the International Air
Transportation Association (IATA) Airline
Monitor that conducts an annual, cross-
sectional poll of international frequent flyers
on issues ranging from airport signposting to
washroom conditions (Adam-Smith, 1997,
1998). Recent quantatitive research has
focused on developing indexes of specific
quality-related aspects of airport design such
as walking distance, orientation, capacity
levels, and lounge seating (Brink and
Maddison, 1975; Feldman and Shields, 1998;
Lemer, 1992; Rowland, 1994; Seneviratne
and Martel, 1994; Tretheway, 1998). By and
large, all of this research has taken a passenger
perspective. Other work has attempted to
compare airport operations from a financial
performance perspective (Mackenzie-
Williams, 1998). This work is clearly of more
concern to airport operators and owners.
These efforts, while incomplete in and of
themselves, have provided a base on which to
construct a comprehensive index of airport
quality. We believe that such an index is
needed for a number of reasons. From an
airport's point of view, the lack of a
comprehensive index has limited its ability to
benchmark the operation of its own airport.
This in turn has hampered airport efforts to
obtain funding for infrastructure
improvements from private and governmental
sources. From a customer point of view,
airports have often been seen as a take-it-or-
leave-it proposition. This is due to the fact
that airports have traditionally been perceived
as natural monopolies. Even if one found the
parking arrangements poor, the terminal
facilities confusing, the food and retail
concessions limited and expensive, or the
ground transportation facilities congested, the
consumer has felt forced to accept the
situation by airlines and airport authorities.
The inability of airports and their customers
to grasp a clear metric or establish a clear
standard for performance has only fueled
consumer discontent. In addition, with the
258
Managing Service Quality
Volume 10 . Number 4 . 2000 . 257±262
renewed awareness of both regional and
national competition between airports, airport
management has become increasingly in need
of a normalized measure of airport quality and
performance. A comprehensive index should
address the needs and issues of all consumers
and stakeholders. Figure 1 identifies the key
components of the airport industry. The first
column of boxes lists the key consumers of
airport services. The third column of boxes
defines some of the services that such
consumers expect at airport facilities. With
this figure in mind, the first step in our
process was to begin to identify the key factors
believed to improve the quality of the airport
experience for its various customers.
Method
Following a review of the existing literature,
we developed a list of key airport quality
factors as seen by various stakeholders (Table
I). Within each of these areas, a number of
issues have also been identified. For example,
concerns in terms of waiting areas include
walking distances to terminals, accessibility,
waiting times, level of occupancy, and
availability of seating. Under the area of
shopping and restaurants, issues identified
include accessibility, variety, price, and
location. Special services include availability
of money exchange, cash machines, rental
facilities, travel agents, etc. We then
developed a questionnaire to be directed to
airport directors and consultants. These
individuals were contacted through various
means, including a questionnaire mailed out
to members of the Airports Council
International, North America and direct
contact at several airport-related events
(Airport Concessions Conference,
Transportation Safety Board, etc).
Approximately 550 questionnaires were
mailed or distributed.
The questionnaire was designed to achieve
two main objectives. First, we asked the
airport operators and consultants to weigh
(on a scale of 1-100) the importance of the
identified factors to airport quality. This
question specifically asks for their opinion. In
a subsequent question, we ask them to rate
the same factors from a passenger perspective
in order to gauge the extent to which their
perceptions were ``passenger-focused''.
Second, we wished to determine if the airport

Dawna L. Rhoades, Blaise Waguespack Jr and Seth Young
Figure 1 The airport industry
Table I Key factors in airport quality
Customer
Passengers
Airport administration
Airlines/air cargo
Employee/tenants
Developing a quality index for US airports Managing Service Quality
Volume 10 . Number 4 . 2000 . 257±262
operators collected feedback from their
Factor passengers and/or conducted surveys to
obtain such information. One question asked
Waiting areas
them to provide the number of monthly
Connecting flights
Baggage delivery comments received on key factors (positive
Passport/customs and negative). A second question asked if,
Efficiency/speed of check-in and how, they solicited information about the
Ground transportation quality of airport services.
Special services
Parking
Shopping/retail service
Food/beverage
Analysis and results
Frequency/availability of flights and
To date we have received a total of 150
destinations
Capacity
responses for a response rate of 27 percent.
Design Table II provides the means and standard
Services deviations for the key factors' weightings of
Capacity importance. As the table indicates, duty free
Runway shopping and special services received the
Terminal lowest weighting, although their standard
Services deviations were among the highest for any key
Fees factor. It is possible that this area of
Services
disagreement is related to the type of airport
Parking
operator reporting. Obviously, airports with a
Location
Services substantial international traffic flow would be
likely to consider duty free shopping facilities
259
 Developing a quality index for US airports Managing Service Quality
Dawna L. Rhoades, Blaise Waguespack Jr and Seth Young Volume 10 . Number 4 . 2000 . 257±262

Table II Results of survey weighting of airline-airport interface: gate boarding

Factor N Min Max Mean SD
areas, baggage claim facilities, and
information display. The final factor includes
Parking 144 10 100 84.6 16.6 a single item: inter-terminal transportation.
Rental car services 144 20 100 74.5 19.3
Food and beverage 144 10 100 75.9 19.2
Rest-rooms 144 10 100 82.8 18.4
Gate boarding areas 145 10 100 78.9 18.3
Discussion
Baggage claim facilities 145 10 100 80.8 17.5
Our results appear to confirm the importance
Ground transportation 143 10 100 77.0 18.8
of the key factors relating to airport quality
Retail 144 1 100 62.8 24.1
identified from previous research. However, it
Duty free shops 135 0 100 45.3 27.6
is possible that airport operators are accessing
Information display systems 144 8 100 79.4 19.3
the importance of these quality factors from
Intra-terminal transportation 134 0 100 75.0 23.6
the viewpoint of a single user group since their
Special services 103 0 100 57.5 26.1
weightings were statistically indistinguishable
from those they attributed to passengers.
and special services such as money exchange
Their factor weightings also closely matched
operations more important than airports the reported passenger feedback numbers.
serving a largely domestic base. The highest This does not necessarily mean that airport
average weighting was given to parking, operators are not aware of the concerns or
restrooms, and baggage handling facilities. issues important to other stakeholders. As
Paired t-tests were performed on these items public entities, they must of necessity be
and the identical items that respondents were aware of the political impact of any action. On
asked to weigh from a passenger perspective. the other hand, this does not mean that they
In all but one case (special services), there was ``understand that the airlines, other service
no statistical difference between the operators' providers, and the public are all stakeholders
view of quality factors and their reported and must be treated as such'' (Tarry, 2000).
perception of passenger quality issues. In a recent report funded by the
In order to identify broader areas of quality PricewaterhouseCoopers Endowment for
concern, a factor analysis was performed on The Business of Government, Tarry (2000)
the weighted factors. Table III reports the has suggested that airports have a public-
results of the analysis using varimax rotation. utility mentality that has fostered little
Four factors emerged from the analysis. The innovation. One of the many factors cited as
first factor addresses passenger service issues: inhibiting change is the hesitancy of airlines to
food and beverage, rest-room facilities, retail support anything that is not perceived as
and duty free, and special services. The directly benefiting their core business. Since
second factor includes issues of airport access their core business is moving passengers in
parking, rental car services, and ground and out of airports, airlines are seen as
transportation. The third factor involves areas opposing any spending that does not lower
their costs or increase their traffic flow. In line
Table III Results of factor analysis with the results of his study, Tarry (2000) has
Factor recommended that airports be given greater
Item 1 2 3 4 autonomy by elected political leaders and
develop performance measures that address
Parking 0.889
the concerns of all airport stakeholders. Our
Rental car services 0.748
index is a modest attempt to address this last
Food and beverage 0.815
recommendation. What remains to be seen is
Rest-rooms 0.697
whether the weightings of other stakeholder
Gate boarding areas 0.880
groups will be consistent enough to allow for a
Baggage claim facilities 0.848
single weighted index for all airports and
Ground transportation 0.701
airport stakeholder groups.
Retail 0.850
Our effort is not without its limitations. We
Duty free shops 0.736
chose to contact airport directors and
Information display 0.625
consultants first for their responses to the
Intra-terminal transportation 0.844
question of key factors because these groups
Special services 0.602
were more easily accessible to us and
260
 Developing a quality index for US airports
Dawna L. Rhoades, Blaise Waguespack Jr and Seth Young
potentially more likely to respond. However,
it is possible that these individuals do not have
a clear understanding of the factors that
matter to their customers. If this is the case,
we hope to be able to detect these differences
in the customer phase of this project through
the inclusion of several open-ended questions
on quality factors. A second limitation of our
approach is that we do not explicitly consider
the effect of different airport configurations
on the quality of service provided, although
this may come out implicitly when the survey
is administered to passengers in different
airports. As any customer can tell you, certain
airport designs tend to be more confusing, to
necessitate longer walks to gates, to produce
more lost baggage, etc. In this regard, airports
themselves might wish to consider some form
of internal benchmarking to determine which
of the internal customers is making best use of
the facilities. These best practice customers
could be used as models for others within the
airport. This approach has merit. We would
still maintain that a comprehensive quality
index that encompasses a large strategic
group of airports is needed in order to help
guide future decision making by the traveling
public and the policy makers that represent
them.
Future directions
Based on the results of the above surveys, we
have developed a formal survey instrument to
be administered to various airport
stakeholders at large hub airports. Although
the survey can eventually be extended to
medium and small hub airports, the need for
infrastructure improvements and the variety
of customers is currently greater at the 30
largest US hub airports. We will attempt to
capture responses from all of the key
stakeholder groups identified above. These
customer-based surveys will be used to
determine the relative importance of the
identified airport quality factors to each
group. The next step in the process will be to
derive a weighted index of the various factors
from a multi-stakeholder perspective. The
ultimate goal is to estimate an integrated,
normalized, and unbiased customer and
operator-based airport quality index. Such an
index would allow for an objective,
straightforward comparison of airports
without any necessary additional
261
Managing Service Quality
Volume 10 . Number 4 . 2000 . 257±262
consideration due to the tremendous variety
of facilities and environments that comprise
today's airport systems.
Conclusion
While no one would deny that the US airport
system is vital to the growth and development
of the US economy or that airports contribute
significantly to the local economies in which
they are located, there is a glaring deficiency
in infrastructure at most major US airports.
For an increasing number of travelers, the
travel experience begins at an airport. Yet, it
has been airline service that has received the
most attention in the travel industry. In fact,
many of the problems that airlines are accused
of can be attributed to inadequate airport
infrastructure such as air traffic control
overload, runway design, etc. leading to flight
delays. Passengers are increasingly exercising
greater choice in travel routing. Air
liberalization is likely to further this trend.
This will place greater pressure on airports to
improve the quality of their infrastructure and
operations in order to avoid losing valuable
passenger traffic. To do this, airports need to
gain a better understanding of the needs of
the various stakeholder groups that they serve
and to benchmark competitors on factors that
matter to these groups. It is our hope that this
research effort will focus attention on
stakeholder-interested development at US
airports. The need is undeniably present.
We would be naõÈve to ignore the fact that
airports and infrastructure investments in
them are highly political affairs. Given the
economic impact of airports on local
communities and the prestige associated with
a highly ranked ``international'' airport, many
decisions are made for reasons that do not
relate to ``quality service''. The ongoing
debate over a third Chicago airport is a case in
point. The proposed site is outside the taxing
authority of the city of Chicago which is
opposed to the project because it would likely
reduce traffic levels at Midway and O'Hare.
Hub carriers at O'Hare are opposed to the
project for similar reasons. On the other hand,
residents near O'Hare do not want to see
further expansion of that airport for reasons of
airport noise. Residents in the county where
the proposed third airport would be located
hope to see more jobs, more tax revenues, and
higher growth. The key to the debate should
be what would be best for the air
 Developing a quality index for US airports
Dawna L. Rhoades, Blaise Waguespack Jr and Seth Young
transportation system and its users. We hope
that our research will make at least a modest
contribution to debate.
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