How to prevent GA traffic appearing at commercial gates?

[martinlest2 58]

Hi. I have a number of airports where I always find Baron 58s, Cessna 172s etc. parked at gates next to large jets.. sometimes the gates have jetways, sometimes not, but whatever, it looks silly!

 

For instance, I've bought Thai Creation's VDSR from SimMarket today (a lovely scenery!!), and little single props are parked at large gates (big enough for 747s) next to my Airbus a321 - but that's not at all the only example.

 

These are not static a/c, as they change over time (and there are no static a/c bgl files in the folder). I checked the AFCADs and where gates have been designated GA Parking, I have changed them to gates but to no avail, the little Cessnas etc.are still there, rubbing shoulders with the big boys. I don't think any specific traffic bgl files have been installed for these airports,

 

What else can I do to ensure that GA traffic isn't parked, at any airport, next to A340s and so on? (Apart from looking odd, it can create problems on arrival, when no parking spaces are free - they are all taken by GA planes. OK, I can 'zap' them thanks to my registered FSUIPC, but that's hardly a satisfying solution...). Do I have to resort to TTools??

 

Many thanks,

 

Martin

[tgibson 11]

The simplest thing is to open the AFD file (i.e. AFCAD or ADE file) of this scenery and add more dedicated GA spots (connected to the taxiway system).  That will keep them out of the airline gates.  Be sure to back up this file *before* editing it!

[martinlest2 58]

Thanks Tom, I'll try that.

[John Hinson 22]

Hi. I have a number of airports where I always find Baron 58s, Cessna 172s etc. parked at gates next to large jets.. sometimes the gates have jetways, sometimes not, but whatever, it looks silly!

 

For instance, I've bought Thai Creation's VDSR from SimMarket today (a lovely scenery!!), and little single props are parked at large gates (big enough for 747s) next to my Airbus a321 - but that's not at all the only example.

 

These are not static a/c, as they change over time (and there are no static a/c bgl files in the folder). I checked the AFCADs and where gates have been designated GA Parking, I have changed them to gates but to no avail, the little Cessnas etc.are still there, rubbing shoulders with the big boys. I don't think any specific traffic bgl files have been installed for these airports,

 

What else can I do to ensure that GA traffic isn't parked, at any airport, next to A340s and so on? (Apart from looking odd, it can create problems on arrival, when no parking spaces are free - they are all taken by GA planes. OK, I can 'zap' them thanks to my registered FSUIPC, but that's hardly a satisfying solution...). Do I have to resort to TTools??

 

Many thanks,

 

Martin

If you are speaking about add-on airports, check the AFD file and make sure the GA parking spots aren't allocated to specific operators. Unless you have seriously excessive GA traffic you should have enough parking spots for your GA away from terminals.

 

If you have too much GA, consider turning down the traffic percentage.

 

John

[martinlest2 58]

Thanks John. I did already check that (re allocated GA spots) - sorry, I should have said (forgot). No, nothing there, but I'll go now and test out a few things with the AFCAD. Some AFCADs are AFX type (yes, addons, some freeware, some payware like the Siem Reep scenery I mentioned), so will have to use ADEx9 for this I guess (with which I am familiar, but not intimately so!).

 

I am abroad right now, by the way, in Sri Lanka, working and won't be in the UK (and using my 'proper' FS PC), for several months at the earliest, so I am making do with my Dell XPS M1730 laptop for FS9 here (with XP x64). It's not as user-friendly as my Win7 PC, to say the least, but better then nothing. Certainly a lot more transportable!

 

Thanks again,

 

Martin

[martinlest2 58]

Mixed results... adding extra GA parking at one airport helped, but at another I have military fighters parked alongside commercial aircraft - some are at jetways! I added extra parking for the fighters, which fill up with more, but still the same a/c are alongside the commercial airliners. I tried changing the parking designation to 'gate' (from GA Parking) but in vain. I just can't shift them!!

 

They are not static a/c - if I remove all the bgl files from the scenery folder apart from the AFCAD they remain - and I can 'zap' them individually with the registered FSUIPC function, so they must be part of the AI traffic.

 

Any ideas? I am stumped. Maybe I should just remove the gates where the F16s park (AFX file, so I'd use ADE) - better empty gates than military jets, I think.

 

M

[tgibson 11]

Military jets are not GA, and need different kinds of parking places (usually Mil Combat).

BTW if you have AFCAD, you can go to Tools/Aircraft Editor, find your F-16 in the list, and click on it.  AFCAD will display the parking type that plane expects, along with the plane's radius (to be sure you make the parking spots large enough).

 

Hope this helps,

[stevewhatmore 2]

If you want to get rid of the default AI go to your FS9 file on your computer open scenery/world/scenery and find traffic 030528 bgl.

take this out but save as backup or just disable it in situe.

You will now have no default AI, but just your own Ai which you have added with your flight plans. ie WOAI or as I do add the plans and AI myself via TTools.

 

Steve

[martinlest2 58]

Hi.. thanks. I have add-on AI, so the default file is already deactivated.

 

No the F16s are not GA, I agree! There is a military base at the airport which is full of fighters, but they still also park at the commercial terminal, no matter what the parking spots are labelled/designated (Mil_Combat, Gate, Parking, GA_Parking...)

 

I am not sure I can be bothered with TTools right now - it's not an airport I shall use all that much, so for the present, I have just removed the 'offending' gates, using ADE. But I will check with AFCAD2 about the parking spots the planes expect - I had forgotten about that feature (what a great tool AFCAD2 is!!). The a/c are not F16s though, I just said that off the top of my head - not sure what they are (I am not a military expert!), they look a bit like English Electric Lightnings, but suppose they are not!

 

At the airports where GA a/c park with the Boeings, adding extra GA parking spots seems to have helped.

 

Thanks...

 

Martin

[martinlest2 58]

OK, I seem to have fixed this. I simply added a load of GA and military parking spaces (not connected to the taxi system) inside one of the hangars. Now all the GA spots and commercial gates are free of MIGs (or whatever they are) - I guess they are all on top of each other inside the hangar. The military airport opposite is still populated by fighters, so all seems well.

 

Thanks for the ideas.

 

Martin

[N60JBravo 27]

Of all the different parking parameters, the only one that will always control AI parking is the size of the spot.

 

Parking type and codes are used to score AI parking spots yet they will not stop AI from parking there if there is no other available spots.

 

Another key component is the traffic file name.

 

When the sim loads AI it loads the traffic files in alphabetical order.

 

This is why WoAI files have prefixes like 000_, so they get loaded first.

 

Adding parking spots that aren't connected to the taxi system will help deal with your AI when the sim loads. So this will help at your departure airport.

 

However this will not help at your destination as landing AI will never be assigned to those spots and will go to the gates if that is all that is open.

 

If you really want to get into this you should get the AI Flight Planner from- http://stuff4fs.com/open.asp?JS=TRUE

 

AIFP has a traffic analyzer that will scan your traffic files and give you a report that shows you if an airport has enough parking spots available.

 

regards,

Joe

[martinlest2 58]

Of all the different parking parameters, the only one that will always control AI parking is the size of the spot.

 

I thought that was probably so, but wasn't sure. Of course trying to exclude small aircraft in favour of larger ones presents a problem in that respect...

 

Adding parking spots that aren't connected to the taxi system will help deal with your AI when the sim loads. So this will help at your departure airport. However this will not help at your destination as landing AI will never be assigned to those spots and will go to the gates if that is all that is open.

 

Hmm, yes, that's very true of course! I can't add taxi links though or I'll be seeing a/c crossing flower beds (or whatever) and disappearing into hangars! I'll have to have all the extra parking spots somewhere else, out of the way of the main apron, and connect them up to the taxiways.

 

I am pretty sure I have AI Flight Planner installed ... but haven't used it for ages. I'll check it out anyway before I make any other changes.

 

Many thanks for the reply,

 

Martin

[Goldenrocket 9]

Have you tried to assign parking codes to miltary parkings and aricraft.cfg - something like " F16"?

 

Bernard

[martinlest2 58]

Hi Bernard,

 

No, not in this instance, but past experience and as far as I have understood from over 11 years on this forum is that that never helps. Have you found that it does? I can try it if you say you have had positive results. I think that it is true, only the parking radius seems to have any real effect.... In any case, It would take me some time to locate the offending AI aircraft bgl files - I am not even sure what the aircraft are! Russian, but I have so many different AI a/c installed I'd hardly know where to start!

 

In practice the problem I had is fixed by creating non-linked parking spots, because the issue was with military jets at commercial gates: the jets, although part of AI, never seem to go anywhere, so when I arrive at the airport I do not have a problem, as anticipated above. Had the issue been with GA planes, my 'solution' (as suggested by Tom) wouldn't really have worked when arriving at the airport, but with the military aircraft things seem OK. I'll fly into the airport tomorrow (VDPP) and check how things are.

 

M.

[N60JBravo 27]

It would take me some time to locate the offending AI aircraft bgl files

This is super easy to do.

 

Download the Traffic Toolbox SDK from- http://www.fsdeveloper.com/forum/resources/traffic-toolbox-sdk.41/ or the Avsim library has it, though I think you will get all of the SDKs in one package at Avsim.

 

Run the installer for the SDK, move the TrafficToolbox.dll to the FS9 Modules folder.

 

Now you will have a new Menu item in FS9. Open the Traffic Toolbox Explorer and click on the "Airport" column header. This will sort that column alphabetically.

 

Hint- pause the sim while you are doing this or the TTE list will constantly update.

 

Scroll down the list until you find the block of entries for that airport.

 

Find the entry for the airplane in question. (double click on the entry to see that plane in a new View Window).

 

One of the columns will give you not only the traffic file for that plane, it will give you the path to the folder it is in.

 

In just a few seconds you can figure out what traffic file spawns a given AI airplane.

 

regards,

Joe