I launched an MVP for US Air Force mission planners to manage 4-dimensional airspace library

• Conducted 20+ user interviews across multiple Air Operations Centers to understand and map the current processes for mission planning and airspace management

• Crafted roadmap to digitize a previously manual, error-prone airspace request process

• Implemented geospatial map visualization to enhance situational awareness

• Devised automated system suggestions to manage location, altitude, and time conflicts - significantly decreasing mission planning time and reducing overall airspace conflicts

users:

• air force command and control mission planners requesting airspace

• airspace managers provisioning airspace

problems:

• planes should not collide mid-air, and certain complicated missions require precise airspace planning to ensure certain planes fly in the right places at the right times (and altitudes).

• people who request airspaces don’t have a ton of visibility into existing airspace libraries and often don’t specialize in airspace knowledge, leading to messy and incomplete requests.

• airspace managers need an easy way to deconflict airspaces that overlap in location, altitude and time.

goals: 

• standardize airspace request formats to include all necessary information

• give airspace requestors a chance to deconflict their own airspace requests systematically

• give airspace managers an easier way to manage more complex airspace conflicts

airspace requestor outcomes: 

• fill out complete airspace requests digitally

• be alerted to potential conflicts, and be given tools to troubleshoot on their own

airspace manager outcomes: 

• receive and review pending airspace requests

• understand how to troubleshoot issues on my own + more easily locate the affected parties I need to talk to when I need to fix complex airspace conflicts

lessons learned:

• sometimes your MVP looks nothing like your intended future product

• patience is needed when working with any government organization (concerning stakeholder management and user access, in particular)