Optimal Selection of Airport Runway Configurations

Dimitris Bertsimas (), Michael Frankovich () and Amedeo Odoni ()
Additional contact information
Dimitris Bertsimas: Operations Research Center, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02139
Michael Frankovich: Operations Research Center, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02139
Amedeo Odoni: Operations Research Center, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02139

Operations Research, 2011, vol. 59, issue 6, 1407-1419

Abstract: We present a mixed integer programming (MIP) model to solve the problems of (i) selecting an airport's optimal sequence of runway configurations and (ii) determining the optimal balance of arrivals and departures to be served at any moment. These problems, the runway configuration management (RCM) problem and the arrival/departure runway balancing (ADRB) problem, respectively, are of critical importance in minimizing the delay of both in-flight and on-the-ground aircraft along with their associated costs. We show that under mild assumptions on the time required to change between configurations, large realistic problem instances can be solved within several seconds. Furthermore, as assumptions are relaxed, optimal solutions are still found within several minutes. Comparison with a sophisticated baseline heuristic reveals that in many cases the potential reduction in cost from using the method is significant and could be expected to be of the order of at least 10%. Finally, we present an extension of the MIP model to solve these two problems for a group of airports in a metropolitan area such as New York ( metroplex ), where operations at each airport within the metroplex might have an impact on operations at some of the other airports due to limitations in shared airspace.

Keywords: transportation; air traffic; programming; integer; applications (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2011
References: View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (11)

Downloads: (external link)
http://dx.doi.org/10.1287/opre.1110.0956 (application/pdf)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:inm:oropre:v:59:y:2011:i:6:p:1407-1419

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in Operations Research from INFORMS Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Chris Asher ().