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Call: New base airport for FlightGear [2019.2]

Postby Isaak » Fri May 03, 2019 12:43 pm

Since 2016, every new release of a new stable FlightGear version comes with a new base airport. The release plan has changed from 2 stable releases to 4 stable releases in that year. In 2018, it was decided to skip the 2018.4 release, because the 2018.3 release was delayed by three months and only released in December because some mayor bugs didn't get fixed earlier. Also, it was decided to keep the base airport for all the releases over a year, and only change it with the final, completely bug free release of the year (e.g. PHNL for FG 2018.3). Changing the base airport with every release proved to be a bit too ambitious, partly because much work was needed on PHNL to get it ready for release and three months was just too short to finish that work.

Call: suggest the new base airport of FlightGear!

At the moment the 2019.1 release (initially planned for February 17th) is almost three months overdue. This will probably mean (but hasn't been decided yet) that we will end with three or even two releases this year, thus it is highly desirable that we choose a new base airport soon, so that it can be finished by September to accommodate the stable 2019.2 or 2019.3 release.

Do you know a nicely developed airport in a stunning scenery you'd like to make more popular? Do you want to draw FG attention to your country? Are you involved in scenery developments and want your work to be prominently visible? This is your chance to get involved!

What's needed now?

If you have a good idea for a default airport, please post a short description along with two screenshots (airport terminal buildings and airport seen embedded into the surrounding scenery) below. Once we have a few options (by next Sunday, May 12th at 0700Z), we'll have a poll and pick the most popular result. You can take a look at the previous topic and re-suggest airports that didn't make it yet, but we start with a new list because the previous one is almost two years old.

Desired features are:

* well developed terminal buildings (on par with the other default airports)
* preferably (but not mandatory) the .850 apt format, with curved taxiways, as we want to show what FlightGear is capable of out of of the box.
* suitable for airliner operations
* nice scenery for VFR flights in the vicinity, possibly also smaller airports, ideally developed
* usability (should not need a gaming computer to get usable framerates)
(* possibly working AI traffic)

What'll be needed later?

For the airport that gets picked as the next default, we'd like to see a Wiki page describing the airport and popular VFR activities in the surroundings. Feel free to also share other aviation fun facts of the country with FG enthusiasts.

A general effort by scenery developers to populate the surroundings even more is also not the worst of ideas

Will the development team create better terrain for location XXX if it gets picked?

Usually the holdup for more detailed scenery is not bad intention but just publicly available data - the scenery is usually as good as the data we have permits. So the answer in general is no - we can't do that easily, unless you or someone else takes up this task.

I want to see my home airport featured!

If the airport is already developed, Just place it here!

If the airport is not developed yet, get involved! Just placing buildings in the right places is easy but will have a big impact!

So - let's all help to make FG more international by migrating around the world - show us what's to see in your region, or whatever you found elsewhere in the world!

A general hint: this website, maintained by KL666, lists most (if not all) of the developed airports around the globe that are available through Terrasync, with the ability to filter them on quality level.

This topic will be locked and the poll will be opened on Sunday May 12th around 0700Z. Make sure to post your candidate well in advance! If you have any comments on a suggestion, please, do feel free to react in this topic!
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Re: Call: New base airport for FlightGear [2019.2]

Postby legoboyvdlp » Fri May 03, 2019 1:35 pm

I propose LICC at Sicily- it requires development, but I can make a custom scenery fairly quickly - it would just need modelled airport buildings.
Image
This airport is very close to Mount Etna and would show off the volcanoes nicely.
Image
There are four airports on Sicily and one on the mainland very close by to fly to as well as Pantelleria island.

Also, I propose GCLP airport - it already has a fairly nice custom scenery by D-ECHO and merspieler has a xplane scenery to convert - https://forums.x-plane.org/index.php?/files/file/41679-gclp-gran-canaria-canarias-spain-x-plane-11/ which I'm sure would look very nice in Flightgear.

Image

Finally, I propose LPMA airport - which also has a custom scenery by D-ECHO. It looks very nice already. It probably would only need development of osm2city and development of LPPS. It seems that airport is missing!

Image

Image

Image

Both the latter have various airports in the surrounding islands which also probably could use some development. Probably, the entire region of the Canarys and Maderia islands could be included in the package.
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Re: Call: New base airport for FlightGear [2019.2]

Postby V12 » Fri May 03, 2019 7:19 pm

I modified D-ECHO's Madeira - removed terrain for Porto Santo, used default or fgmembers terrain (I don't remebrer, it was in january) and then added some basic buildings :
Image
Screenshot is from initial version dated 2019-01-27

Actual version has small bug in terrain :

Image
Last edited by V12 on Fri May 03, 2019 7:35 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Call: New base airport for FlightGear [2019.2]

Postby D-ECHO » Fri May 03, 2019 7:33 pm

LPPS is now in the repository @V12, I just forgot to push
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Re: Call: New base airport for FlightGear [2019.2]

Postby V12 » Fri May 03, 2019 7:38 pm

Thank You. I downloaded it and tested. You should try repair that grass chunk on the apron.
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Re: Call: New base airport for FlightGear [2019.2]

Postby vanosten » Sat May 04, 2019 7:07 am

Once we get closer to a decision, I can do an osm2city build for the region. I had a look at Scicilly - and in the larger cities the majority of buildings are actually mapped. For the rest osm2city can put buildings at plausible places.
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Re: Call: New base airport for FlightGear [2019.2]

Postby Thorsten » Sat May 04, 2019 7:16 am

I'd propose Keflavik Airport (BIKF) on Iceland at this point.

Keflavik is a shared Civilian/Military airport with nice long runways capable of taking craft of any size - in fact, it was an emergency landing site for the Space Shuttle.

In FG, it is nicely developed so far, both on the military side

Image

and the civilian terminal:

Image


In addition, Iceland is a nice bit of scenery - it has CORINE-Quality landclass data, making it a pleasant visual experience. Since much transportation in Iceland is via air, there's dozens of small airstrips scattered throughout the place, making bush flying a distinct possibility. Since the weather conditions are often poor, there's plenty of radio nav beacons available throughout the island, allowing to get familiar with the procedures.

In the vicinity, there's quite a few other developed airports, among them Akureyri or Himeay (see below)

Image

There's plenty to discover - Fjords and Glaciers, desolate moonscapes, swampy floodlands, rugged volcanic mountains, and I'm currently actively developing several of the volcanoes in the area (currently I have three done, but there will almost certainly come more - also geothermal areas and geysirs).

Image

Image

In summary, I think Keflavik is a good option because

* we have detailed terrain
* several airports in the areas are already fairly well developed
* it is generally not very well known
* it offers things to do for airliners, regional planes, bushplanes, helicopters and even spacecraft - in summary pretty much everyone
* the surrounding area is generally beautiful
* and several volcanoes offer additional flight experiences
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Re: Call: New base airport for FlightGear [2019.2]

Postby Isaak » Sun May 12, 2019 5:07 am

Only three hours left to propose a new base airport!
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Re: Call: New base airport for FlightGear [2019.2]

Postby vanosten » Sun May 12, 2019 6:56 am

I suggest that PHNL keeps being an option for voting.
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Re: Call: New base airport for FlightGear [2019.2]

Postby tonghuix » Sun May 12, 2019 8:00 am

I suggest Boston Logan Intl (KBOS), it is now more realistic than before, could you please consider it?
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Re: Call: New base airport for FlightGear [2019.2]

Postby Thorsten » Sun May 12, 2019 8:11 am

The idea of changing the default airport does not really go well with using the same airports (Honolulu, Boston,...) as defaults again and again.
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Re: Call: New base airport for FlightGear [2019.2]

Postby wlbragg » Sun May 12, 2019 8:56 am

At least a portion of Hawaii chain are always packaged with a release because of the tutorials for the c172p.
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Re: Call: New base airport for FlightGear [2019.2]  

Postby Isaak » Sun May 12, 2019 11:25 am

I had an unexpected visitor. Poll will be open soon!

I'd also prefer not to reuse an airport that has already served as the base airport, because that goes against the vision we have to show something new every year. A part of Hawaii will be shipped with the base package anyway to be able to keep the tutorials with the c172p, as Thorsten pointed out. So I will not put PHNL and KBOS in the poll. If there is a strong demand to reuse an airport, I'd suggest to bring it up on the mailing list so we can consider if we want to schange our vision on base airports.

Kind regards,

Isaak
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