Airline and Service Provider Collaborative Algorithms for Flight Route and Delay Decisions

In this paper, algorithms are presented that model increased collaboration between the air traffic service provider and airspace users on flight route and delay decisions. These decisions are part of the traffic flow management function that constrains demand below capacity. Currently, users cannot make changes to the route or delay of a flight close to or after departure time and instead must send requests to the service provider who attempts to accommodate the users based on congestion and workload limitations. To mitigate this limitation, the algorithms model a new collaboration scheme. First, users directly implement their flight route and delay decisions, when the flight is further from the congested airspace, without sending a request to the service provider. The service provider can override their action when the flight becomes closer to the congested airspace. Second, users send flight ranking, route ranking and location-to-absorb-delay preferences to the service provider. The service provider may reject these preferences if needed. The algorithms are used to study whether increasing users’ responsibility and increasing their preferences would prevent maintaining demand below capacity. To prevent demand from exceeding capacity the algorithms impose limits, such as available routes and imposed flow rates, on user decisions. A simulation case demonstrates the impact of the collaboration schemes on reducing demand below capacity within an en-route center. Preliminary results indicate that aircraft delay and, to a larger extent, passenger delay are reduced. However, congestion is reduced by a smaller amount when user preferences are considered by the service provider. Giving users responsibility according to service provider limits and delay feedback did not increase congestion.