Network centrality driven airport efficiency: A weight-restricted network DEA

Network centrality is an intermediary between airport resource utilization and air traffic generation. A central position in the network with frequent and regular flights with hub nodes can boost air traffic by providing better accessibility, resulting in more efficient use of airport resources. However, this relationship has been largely ignored in the literature. Using data from the Turkish airport industry, this paper proposed a weight-restricted Network Data Envelopment Analysis model, which considers network centrality measures as the cornerstone intermediates that establish the link between airport resources and the traffic volume handled. In the first stage, called networkability, assets such as runways, terminals, aprons, and special purpose vehicles, and exogenous factors including population, socio-economic development, and tourist arrivals are used to accomplish the network integration with other airports, as measured by degree centrality, betweenness centrality, and eigenvector centrality. In the second stage, called traffic generation, this network integration allows for aircraft movements and workload unit to be handled. Criteria weights of model variables were calculated using Criteria Importance Through Intercriteria Correlation. The main findings indicate that 1) the weight-restriction procedure improved the robustness of Network DEA, 2) the proposed two-stage structure reveals whether performance losses are due to networkability or traffic generation capabilities and helps to identify the right policies for performance improvement, 3) the Turkish airports generally suffer from the inability to establish connections in the domestic network, 4) the pandemic has significantly improved the domestic networkability of airports due to mandatory direct flights while devastating the traffic generation capability, 5) low betweenness centrality is the main reason for weak networkability, and 6) good networkability may not ensure air traffic generation.