Airline Network Planning and Scheduling

15Examples on the Schedule Adjustment Problem

15.1 Flight Deletion

Consider the hypothetical airline described in Chapters 12 and 13. Assume this airline is cutting part of its service to respond to a network‐wide demand reduction and/or to restructure its cost. Adjusting the schedule requires deciding which flights to eliminate from the schedule. To solve this problem, we use the formulation presented for the schedule adjustment problem in Chapter 14. The net revenue (profit) of each flight is calculated and assumed given as an input to the problem. Figure 15.1 shows a snapshot of the Excel sheet developed for the problem. The table in columns C and D gives the net revenue associated with assigning each of the 16 flights to each of the two fleet types.

Figure 15.1 Net revenue for the 16 flights when assigned to each fleet type.

Next, the decision variables are defined, and the incurred net revenue is calculated by multiplying the net revenue for each flight by its corresponding decision variable. Figure 15.2 gives another snapshot of the Excel sheet, in which the decision variables for the fleet assignments are initialized in columns G and H. Columns L and M give the incurred net revenue associated with the initial values assigned to the decision variables. The decision variables associated with the number of aircraft that remain overnight at the different stations and the ...