FAA Begins E-IDS Rollout at First Five Facilities

WASHINGTON — The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has begun deploying its Enterprise Information Display System (E-IDS), identifying five initial facilities as it moves to replace aging equipment used to display essential information to air traffic controllers.

The agency's November 5 announcement identifies the first recipients as Atlantic City International Airport (ACY), Nashville International Airport (BNA), Frederick Douglass/Greater Rochester International Airport (ROC), and data-processing hubs in Atlanta and Salt Lake City. The FAA plans to install E-IDS at 435 sites by the end of 2028.

The system brings weather information, equipment alerts and operational advisories into one display. It is also intended to improve the collection and distribution of pilot weather reports and Notices to Airmen. The FAA says it will replace four information-display systems dating to the 1980s, including technology that relied on floppy disks.

What E-IDS Changes for Controllers

The FAA's E-IDS program description identifies timely notice distribution and pilot-report capabilities as safety issues the project is designed to address. It also calls for integration with System Wide Information Management, the agency's infrastructure for sharing aviation information.

That makes the rollout an upgrade to the information controllers consult while managing aircraft. Its scope is distinct from the separate radar, radio and telecommunications replacements in the wider modernization effort.

E-IDS also predates that latest initiative. Leidos announced its FAA development contract in August 2020, describing an approximate US$292m value with a four-year base period and 11 one-year options.

The program later changed direction. The Government Accountability Office (GAO), in its September 14 report on air traffic control modernization, said the FAA terminated the associated vendor contract in May 2025 to pursue in-house development. GAO had previously identified delays and a significantly increased cost estimate for E-IDS. The 2020 contract figure does not establish the cost of the current rollout.

Cost and Scheduling Scrutiny

In the same report, GAO found that the FAA lacked a reliable lifecycle cost estimate for the broader modernization initiative and an integrated master schedule for its first phase. GAO warned that uncoordinated installations at the same facilities could affect controller operations.

Those wider findings do not assess the five installations named in November. Airways has previously covered the funding and scheduling challenges facing the air traffic control overhaul.

The November announcement does not provide individual commissioning dates, reliability-test results or measured reductions in flight delays.