An enhanced L-band Digital Aeronautical Communications System (LDACS) may include LDACS ground stations, and LDACS airborne stations configured to communicate with the LDACS ground stations. Each LDACS airborne station may be configured to collect respective routing metrics, and each LDACS airborne station may be selectively operable as at least one of a host and client. The enhanced LDACS may also include a peer-to-peer server configured to establish a mesh network topology from the LDACS airborne stations based upon the routing metrics, and selectively operate each LDACS airborne station as at least one of the host and client.