Exact Approaches for

Aircraft Fleeting and Routing

Mehdi MRAD
 Presentation Outline
 Problem Definition

 Literature Review

 Solution Approaches

• Network-flow formulation

• Brance-and-Price
 Motivations

 Highly competitive environment

 Airline companies have to control their operating
costs by managing their aircraft and crews effectively

Extensive use of analytical

techniques to
solve complex problems related to
airline operations planning
Problem
Problem Definition
Definition
Literature
Literature Review
Solution
Review
Solution Approaches
Approaches
Airline Planning Processes
Future
Future Directions
Directions

Flight Scheduling

Fleet Assignment

Aircraft Routing

Crew Scheduling
Problem
Problem Definition
Definition
Literature
Literature Review
Solution
Review
Solution Approaches
Approaches
Airline Planning Processes
Future
Future Directions
Directions

Which cities to fly to and

Flight Scheduling at what time ?

Fleet
FleetAssignment
Assignment

Aircraft
AircraftRouting
Routing

Crew
CrewScheduling
Scheduling
Problem
Problem Definition
Definition
Literature
Literature Review
Solution
Review
Solution Approaches
Approaches
Airline Planning Processes
Future
Future Directions
Directions

Which cities to fly to and

Flight
FlightScheduling
Scheduling at what time ?

Which aircraft type should be

Fleet Assignment assigned to each flight ?

Aircraft
AircraftRouting
Routing

Crew
CrewScheduling
Scheduling
Problem
Problem Definition
Definition
Literature
Literature Review
Solution
Review
Solution Approaches
Approaches
Airline Planning Processes
Future
Future Directions
Directions

Which cities to fly to and

Flight
FlightScheduling
Scheduling at what time ?

Which aircraft type should be

Fleet
FleetAssignment
Assignment assigned to each flight ?

What is the sequence of flight legs

Aircraft Routing to be flown by each aircraft ?

Crew
CrewScheduling
Scheduling
Problem
Problem Definition
Definition
Literature
Literature Review
Solution
Review
Solution Approaches
Approaches
Airline Planning Processes
Future
Future Directions
Directions

Which cities to fly to and

Flight
FlightScheduling
Scheduling at what time ?

Which aircraft type should be

Fleet
FleetAssignment
Assignment assigned to each flight ?

What is the sequence of flight legs

Aircraft
AircraftRouting
Routing to be flown by each aircraft ?

Which crew should be

Crew Scheduling assigned to each flight ?
Problem
Problem Definition
Definition
Literature
Literature Review
Solution
Review
Solution Approaches
Approaches
Airline Planning Processes
Future
Future Directions
Directions

 Interaction between the problems

 the solution of one problem becomes
the input for the following one

 The solution of one problem does not take into

account the considerations that affect subsequent
problems

It results in overall suboptimal solutions

 Airline Planning Processes
 Airline companies are actively seeking to model
and solve these problems simultaneously

 A strategy is emerging as a new operational

concept for airlines

Managing the entire

Supply Chain
 Airline Planning Processes

Managing the entire Supply Chain

Put the right plane (with the right number of seats)

and the right crew on the right route

at the right time
 Problem Definition

Flight
FlightScheduling
Scheduling

The Integrated
Fleet Assignment
Aircraft Fleeting and
Routing Problem
Aircraft Routing

Crew
CrewScheduling
Scheduling
 Problem Definition
Flight schedule
with demands
Determine the
Aircraft fleet individual
Costs aircraft
 Fixed charges assigned to
 Opportunity cost
each flight
 Deadhead costs AFRP
Activity Constraints Build the
sequence of
 Turn-time restrictions flights to be
 Periodicity
 Maintenance
flown by each
… aircraft
 Problem Definition

Costs
The cost cij of assigning aircraft i to flight j includes :

 the fixed operating charges fij (fuel, taxes, etc.)

 the opportunity cost oij if the demand on flight j does

not fit the capacity of aircraft i

 cij = fij + c βjc * max(djc – Qic,0)

• βjc : penalty of losing one spilled passenger of flight j for class c

• djc : demand of flight j for class c
Problem
Problem Definition
Definition
Literature
Literature Review
Solution
Review
Solution Approaches
Approaches
Problem Definition
Future
Future Directions
Directions

Costs

If flights j and k are flown consecutively by aircraft i, and

the destination station of flight j is different from the origin

station of flight k then a deadhead cost sijk is incurred

 Literature Review

Flight Scheduling

Fleet Assignment  Desaulniers et al. (1997)

 Barnhart et al. (1998)
 Ioachim et al. (1999)
Aircraft Routing
 Rosenberger et al. (2004)

Crew Scheduling
Flow based formulation
 Solution Approach - Building Phase

 F : set of available aircraft

• For each aircraft i F is defined

 A type (turn-time, number of seats Q)

 An initial station

 Planned unavailability period

 Solution Approach - Building Phase

 L : Set of scheduled flights

• For each flight j L is defined :

 An origin and destination stations

 A departure time
 An anticipated demand for each class
 Problem Formulation

Define :
 For each aircraft i, let Gi = (Ni, Ai) be a time-space
network where :
 Ni is the node set:

• each flight of L that can be flown by the aircraft i is

represented by a node j Ni*

• two dummy nodes o(i) and d(i) presenting the start

and the end stations

 Ni = Ni*  {o(i),d(i) }
 Problem Formulation

Define :
 For each aircraft i, let Gi = (Ni, Ai) be a time-space
network where :
 Ai is the arc set:

• each arc (j,k)  Ai represents a feasible connection

between successive flights

•arcs (o(i),k)

• arcs (j,d(i))
Problem
Problem Definition
Definition
Literature
Literature Review
Benders
Review
Benders Decomposition
Decomposition Problem Formulation
Future
Future Directions
Directions

 For each arc (j, k)  Ai we associate:

 the cost Cij = fij + oij of assigning aircraft i to flight j

 the deadhead cost sijk if the destination station of

flight j is different from the origin station of flight k
 Problem Formulation

Multicommodity
MulticommodityNetwork
NetworkFlow
FlowFormulation
Formulation

 Decision variables xijk  i  F ,  (j,k)  Ai

xijk = 1 if aircraft i is assigned to flight k immediately after flight j

=0 otherwise assignement
assignement ++
deadhead
deadhead costs
costs
Minimize iF (j,k)Ai Cijk xijk
iF j:(j,k) Ai xijk = 1 kL Coupling constraints

j:(j,k) Ai xijk - l:(l,j) Ai xilj = 0  i  F, j  L

kL xis(i),k = 1 iF
kL xikt(i) = 1  i F
xijk {0, 1}  i  F ,  (j,k)   Ai
Branche-and-Price based
approach


Set Covering Formulation


Solution approach
Problem
Problem Definition
Definition
Literature
Literature Review
Branche
Branche &
Review
& Price
Price
Set Covering Formulation
Future
Future Directions
Directions

For each aircraft i

 consider again the time-space network Gi = (Ni, Ai)

 let i the set of feasible routes in Gi

 let Cir be the cost of flying route r by the aircraft i

Cir = jr kr cijk

where cijk = fik + sijk + oik

Fixed Opportunity cost

Operating cost Deadhead cost
Problem
Problem Definition
Definition
Literature
Literature Review
Branche
Branche &
Review
& Price
Price
Set Covering Formulation
Future
Future Directions
Directions

 Define binary constants aijr  i  F ,  j  L ,  r  i :

aijr = 1 if flight j belongs to the route r of i,

=0 otherwise

 Define binary variables yir  i  F ,  r  i:

yir = 1 if aircraft i is assigned to the route r of i,

=0 otherwise
Problem
Problem Definition
Definition
Literature
Literature Review
Branche
Branche &
Review
& Price
Price
Set Covering Formulation
Future
Future Directions
Directions

Minimize iF r i Cir yir (1)

iF r i aijr yir  1 jL (2)

r i yir  1 iF (3)

yir  {0, 1}  i  F ,  r  i (4)

Problem
Problem Definition
Definition
Literature
Literature Review
Branche
Branche &
Review
& Price
Price
Solution Approach
Future
Future Directions
Directions

The set covering formulation has

a large number of variables

Branch-and-Price
(Column Generation)

Solve shortest path problems in an acyclic

graph to generate columns
Problem
Problem Definition
Definition
Literature
Literature Review
Branche
Branche &
Review
& Price
Price
Column Generation
Future
Future Directions
Directions

Objective
Generate column with minimal reduced cost irir

mini F {minr i ir }

Dual variables of (3)

with ir = Cir - j=1m uj aijr - vi

Cost of route ri jr uj

Dual variables of (2)
Problem
Problem Definition
Definition
Literature
Literature Review
Branche
Branche &
Review
& Price
Price
Column Generation
Future
Future Directions
Directions

 Column with minimum reduced cost satisfies:

mini F {minr i ir }

= mini F {minr i Cir - j=1m uj aijr - vi}

= mini F {Ci - vi}


where Ci is the cost of the shortest path in the acyclic

graph G with arc costs: cijk = cijk - uk
i
Problem
Problem Definition
Definition
Literature
Literature Review
Branche
Branche &
Review
& Price
Price
Column Generation
Future
Future Directions
Directions

 For each aircraft i  F, generate many columns with

negative reduced costs:

 Generate the column with the minimum reduced

cost, corresponding to the shortest path in the

acyclic graph G with arc costs cijk
i

 While the minimum reduced cost is negative,

eliminate, from the graph Gi, the nodes of the
generated column and solve again a shortest
path problem
Problem
Problem Definition
Definition
Literature
Literature Review
Branche
Branche &
Review
& Price
Price
Branch-and-Price
Future
Future Directions
Directions

Solve the linear

relaxation LP

Choose a fractional
variable yirir
yir = 1 yir = 0

Generate columns with a ranking

Remove all the nodes of
procedure: generate the k th
route r from the graph
shortest path
Problem
Problem Definition
Definition
Literature
Literature Review
Branche
Branche &
Review
& Price
Price
Branch-and-Price
Future
Future Directions
Directions

 Branching rules: Fractional variable yir /

route r covers the max number of flights

Improvement:
as a second criteria, choose yir / closer to 0.5

 Search strategy: Depth first search

 Pruning strategy:
Use an initial solution obtained by a heuristic approach