Network Analysis of Saudi Airports Using Centrality, Efficiency, and Robustness Measures

Transportation infrastructure of a country is one of the most important indicators of its economic growth. As such, airports play a crucial role in the economic development of a country. Saudi Vision 2030 is a government program launched by the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia which aims to achieve the goal of increased diversification economically, socially and culturally. In line with the vision, King Salman International Airport, to be located in Riyadh the capital city of Saudi Arabia, is expected to transform Riyadh into one of the top ten city economies in the world [9]. In order to give recommendations that will help this development, network analysis is applied to study and understand Saudi Arabia’s airports network (SAAN). Some of the concepts that have been used in network analysis are measures of vertex centralities, efficiency, and robustness. Measures of centrality, such as degree centrality, betweenness centrality, closeness centrality, and eigenvector centrality, capture the notation of ‘a vertex importance’ in a network [3]. While measures of efficiency, such as diameter and average distance, give an insight into a network connectedness [8]. In addition, robustness measures, such as vertex connectivity and edge connectivity are used to ensure reliability of a network [8]. Efficiency and robustness of Saudi Arabia’s airports network (SAAN) can be improved using suggestions based on calculations of the previous measures. Based on our analysis, King Abdulaziz International Airport in Jeddah has the highest centrality. This paper provides valuable insights into SAAN which can be used to make suggestions related to efficiency and robustness of the network.