The U.S. Department of Transportation is testing an artificial intelligence system designed to help manage flight delays and airspace congestion at three airports serving the Washington region. Reagan National Airport, Dulles International Airport and Baltimore/Washington International Thurgood Marshall Airport will be the first airports to use the system, with a national rollout planned by 2028, according to NBC Washington.
The program places the D.C. region at the center of a federal effort to use predictive software in one of the country’s most complex airspaces. Transportation officials say the technology will support air traffic controllers by organizing information and suggesting adjustments, while human officials remain responsible for decisions affecting aircraft.
How the SMART system works
The tool is called SMART, short for Strategic Management of Airspace Routes and Trajectories. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said it can process real-time information, including weather, airport congestion and flight paths, to help identify more efficient routes into and out of airports.
SMART is not intended to control aircraft directly. Instead, it is designed to provide a prompt to the person managing the airspace. Duffy emphasized that the system is predictive and that “it’s always going to be a human that manages the airspace in America.”
Federal Aviation Administration Administrator Bryan Bedford said the software could help address inefficiencies at airports where capacity appears limited. Reagan National, for example, is widely viewed as highly constrained and slot-controlled. Bedford said the airport has significant inefficiencies where available capacity could be better aligned with demand.
That distinction is central to the department’s case for the technology. Officials are presenting SMART as a decision-support system that could give controllers better information about changing conditions, rather than as an autonomous replacement for their judgment.
Controllers and lawmakers raise safety concerns
The National Air Traffic Controllers Association said new technology should complement, not replace, the experience, training and professional judgment of air traffic controllers responsible for the safety of the national airspace system.
Virginia Rep. Don Beyer, whose district includes Reagan National, called for the system’s use to be suspended. Beyer said the FAA should not use his constituents as “guinea pigs” for an unproven AI air traffic control system, citing the 24 million people who travel through DCA each year.
Beyer also said residents remained uncertain about air safety after last year’s fatal accident. He criticized the administration for providing too little public education about the system before its implementation. Beyer said he had been informed that air traffic controllers were not consulted during the system’s design and development and had not been trained to use it before the airports began implementing it.
The concerns focus on readiness as well as the technology itself. Transportation officials describe SMART as a tool for human managers, while critics question whether the airports and controllers have been adequately prepared for its use. The draft of the program does not describe an accident involving SMART or provide technical details about how its recommendations will be evaluated.
D.C. test comes before national rollout
The department said SMART has not been deployed elsewhere in the world, making the three regional airports its first testing ground. The system emerged from an $875 million contract with a Boston-based software company.
The D.C.-area deployment will be studied before the planned national rollout in 2028. The test will provide an opportunity to evaluate how the system handles conditions such as weather, congestion and competing flight paths, although the department has not publicly detailed the criteria it will use.
For passengers, the stated goal is fewer delays and a more efficient experience. Duffy said the public is frustrated with the current level of delays and wants improvements in how airspace is managed.
Whether SMART can deliver those improvements without undermining controller expertise will depend on how its recommendations perform in practice and how the FAA responds to concerns about consultation, training and safety. Officials have drawn a boundary between automated prediction and human control, but the practical limits of that boundary will be tested first at Reagan National, Dulles and BWI.