Aircraft Departure Slot Control Method Based on Multi-objective Optimization

In order to balance efficiency and equity and make best use of slot resources, aircraft departure slots were allocated. According to the decision-making targets of airport control operation departments and airline companies, three kinds of multi-objective optimization methods were established through different combinations of optimization objectives, including flight punctuality rate, passenger delay, flight delay cost, and Gini coefficient. Aiming at the application background of aircraft release in the airport control, an improved artificial fish school algorithm was used to solve the models. When flight delay cost and flight punctuality rate are optimization goals, two Pareto solutions are obtained; compared with those obtained by the ration-by-schedule (RBS) allocation algorithm, the flight delay cost is decreased by 52.9% and 48.6%, and the flight punctuality rate is improved by 62.5% and 75.0%. When flight delay cost and passenger delay are optimization goals, only one solution is obtained; compared with those by the RBS allocation algorithm, the flight delay cost and the passenger delay are reduced by 52.9% and 37.5%, respectively. When efficiency and equity are optimization goals, with the equity being improved, the efficiency was gradually weakened. The method presented in this paper can overcome the defect of the existing methods only considering the efficiency, and it can provide more alternative decision-making programs.