Metrops – Future Air Mobility
The principle

Repeatable, not discretionary

Every complaint is scored by a purpose-built pipeline against the zone plan that applied at the time it was lodged. Two similar complaints in similar circumstances produce similar outcomes, regardless of who is at the desk.

That matters in both directions. A resident can see how a decision was reached rather than being told one was made. An operator faces a standard it can plan against rather than a mood. And a council can explain its position to a councillor, an ombudsman or a journalist without reconstructing anything after the fact.

Five dimensions

What gets assessed

Three dimensions are modelled. Two are always escalated to a person, because they involve judgements a model has no business making.

Noise

Physics-based. Perceived noise level is modelled using ISO 9613 sound propagation, accounting for how sound actually travels to the location where it was experienced.

Visual amenity

Density of distinct aircraft in sight over a time window near the resident — the difference between one aircraft and a steady procession.

Privacy

Proximity of camera-equipped aircraft that were actively recording, rather than the presence of an aircraft alone.

Always human-reviewed

Safety

Escalated to a human reviewer and never automatically closed. A safety complaint is a signal that something may be wrong in the system, not a number to be scored.

Always human-reviewed

Cultural

Escalated to a human reviewer who can apply local context. Cultural significance is knowledge a community holds, not a value a model can infer from a map.

Underneath

Geospatial and acoustic modelling

Argon's assessment runs on a geospatial engine built on PostGIS, combining zone geometry, aircraft activity and acoustic propagation into a single scored outcome.

  • Zone geometryThe published ground-level footprint and ruleset that applied at the time of the event.
  • Acoustic modelISO 9613 propagation, so a noise finding reflects what reached the resident rather than what left the aircraft.
  • Activity contextAircraft presence, density and recording status in the relevant window.
  • Versioned recordThe rule, the input, the model and the outcome, retained together as one auditable item.

The difficult part is not the map. It is the assessment logic — which is also the part a regulator will eventually ask to see.

Next step

Walk a complaint through

Bring a complaint your council has actually received. We will run it through the pipeline and show you the outcome and the reasoning behind it.

Request a demonstration