Related Plans

NextGen Concept of Operations
The Concept of Operations, developed by JPDO, is a document that provides a basic operational description of how the air transportation system will function in 2025. The version released for comment in March 2007 describes all segments of a flight, from the time an aircraft departs until it arrives at its destination, as well as operations that take place before and after a flight, such as flight planning and security screenings. OEP, in turn, defines the major operational changes FAA will make through technologies and procedures that will transform today’s NAS into the NextGen system.

FAA Flight Plan
The Flight Plan is FAA’s five-year strategic plan. It focuses on a select group of high-priority, measurable goals and initiatives for achieving increased aviation safety, greater airspace capacity, international leadership, and organizational excellence. Each FAA office links its respective annual business plan to the Flight Plan. OEP’s near-term initiatives for NextGen are part of the Flight Plan, although the OEP’s timeframe stretches through 2025.

Enterprise Architectures
The NAS and NextGen Enterprise Architectures provide extremely detailed system engineering plans that define timelines and milestones for, and enable the development of, key infrastructure programs. They are the backbone of the OEP. OEP describes the operational changes that these infrastructure programs, in coordination with new procedures, avionics, and other elements, will ultimately provide.

National Aviation Research Plan
Research and development is critical to ensuring the FAA meets NextGen goals. The annual National Aviation Research Plan (NARP) is an integrated, performance-based plan which describes the FAA Research and Development (R&D) programs that support both the day-to-day operations of the National Airspace System and the vision for NextGen. The OEP links R&D activities to the plan’s transformative capabilities, to show explicitly how research is moving FAA toward NextGen.

Capacity Needs of the National Airspace System: 2007-2025 (FACT 2)
The OEP Metro Areas were defined based on this analysis of future airport capacity.