Agencies seek new tech to tackle airport queues

New queue-monitoring technology is set to be rolled out across New Zealand’s major airports by the end of the year, as aviation authorities seek to tackle ongoing problems with large lines.
The Civil Aviation Authority has released a request for proposals on the official government tenders website, seeking a supplier for its airport queue-monitoring project.
According to the tender documents, Wellington Airport and the Civil Aviation Authority last year began using Lidar sensor technology, which detects objects and their distances using laser pulses, to collect queue information and meet the Government’s expectations for improved monitoring.
Transport Minister Simeon Brown had since asked the authority to roll out the technology across other airport terminals, with the request for proposals covering the departure areas of the country’s ‘tier-one’ airports (Auckland, Wellington, Christchurch, Queenstown, Dunedin, and Invercargill).
The successful bidder would need to provide real-time continuous tracking of individual objects without capturing personally identifiable information, with a preference for the use of Lidar. 
The work would be undertaken via a phased approach, with the initial installation process expected to be finished by the end of December.
Long queues for security screening have been a growing problem at some of the country’s main airports.
In March, former prime minister Helen Clark told RNZ that Auckland Airport risked being seen as among the world’s worst when it came to delays, and systemic problems needed to be addressed.
“Every week there’s a different excuse. Everyone needs to pitch in to get this right – it needs the airport itself to be looking at its infrastructure, it needs aviation security to be looking at the quality of its machines, the amount of staffing that it has on,” Clark told RNZ.
When he announced an overhaul of the authority’s board earlier this year, Brown listed “reduced queue times for aviation security” as among its expected priorities.
The Public Service Association, which represents a number of airport security workers, has pointed the finger at a failure to recruit new staff to handle demand, telling RNZ there was “no fat in the system” to deal with unexpected challenges.
The proposed sensor rollout isn’t the first time authorities have turned to technology in a bid to improve the queuing situation.
In mid-2021, Aviation Security began a controversial trial of facial recognition technology to track queues and waiting times. The service went ahead with the trial in the face of objections from the Privacy Commissioner, who warned it could create an “unfortunate and dangerous precedent” for broader government use of such technology in unnecessary environments.
The Aviation Security website notes the trial concluded facial recognition was not the best solution for queue tracking “due to environmental factors affecting the capture and processing rates” which reduced its accuracy.
Lidar is largely regarded as a privacy-friendly alternative to facial recognition software, as it does not collect recognisable images of people’s faces or other biometric data.
Ayolt Wiertsema, Wellington Airport’s general manager of aeronautical operations, told Newsroom the wider work was a direct result of its own installation of passenger-tracking technology last year.
Wiertsema said it was great to see government agencies looking at new technology and innovations to improve queues, and the airport would keep working with them where their help was needed.
In a statement, a Civil Aviation Authority spokeswoman said the tender was part of the organisation’s efforts to get a more accurate picture of passenger journeys through the country’s main airports, “following the direction from the Minister of Transport”.
The authority would use current technology and implement passenger sensor equipment where needed across the departure areas of tier-one airports, and was in the market for an appropriate solution where needed.
The spokeswoman said lessons from the facial recognition trial had been used to inform the current queue-monitoring requirements, as part of the authority’s regular use of trials and proofs of concept for new technologies and practices.