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Cape May Airport Research Taxiway

Facilities & Equipment  /  Cape May Airport Research Taxiway
Aerial view of the taxiway C at Cape May County Airport

Aerial view of the taxiway C at Cape May County Airport

The taxiway has numerous sign pads for experimental signs

The taxiway has numerous sign pads for experimental signs

 

The Cape May County Airport (WWD) in Rio Grande, New Jersey, is a fully in-service general aviation airport that includes the FAA Research Taxiway. Through a collaborative agreement between the FAA and Delaware River and Bay Authority (DRBA), the FAA is able to use this taxiway as an extended research facility close to the William J. Hughes Technical Center for Advanced Aerospace. Here, FAA researchers can conduct airport safety and pavement research in an operational environment. The taxiway provides a single site to continually design, test, evaluate, monitor, and report on state-of-the-art airport safety and pavement technologies in a real-world environment.

The Research Taxiway is 3,250 feet long and 50 feet wide with an additional 50 feet on either side that can be used to simulate a runway for various test scenarios.

 

The Research Taxiway is equipped with:
 
  • A state-of-the-art Lighting Control System
  • A full array of runway or taxiway lights that can be configured for specific tests
  • A lighting vault that provides power and houses research equipment
  • 16 panels around the taxiway that provide 120-volt power to allow equipment testing in the field and ethernet capabilities to send data back to the vault
  • 6 pavement types for various pavement testing and evaluations
  • Numerous sign pads for experimental signs

 

To date, a variety of airport research has been conducted at the Research Taxiway, to include: