A study of the practicality and profit enhancement potential of demand driven dispatch in airline hub operations

Cover title

Bibliographic Details
Main Author: Waldman, Gary L.
Other Authors: Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Flight Transportation Laboratory
Format: Technical Report
Published: [Cambridge, Mass. : Massachusetts Institute of Technology], Flight Transportation Laboratory, [1993] 2012
Subjects:
Online Access:http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/68114
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author Waldman, Gary L.
author2 Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Flight Transportation Laboratory
author_facet Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Flight Transportation Laboratory
Waldman, Gary L.
author_sort Waldman, Gary L.
collection MIT
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spelling mit-1721.1/681142019-04-12T15:08:24Z A study of the practicality and profit enhancement potential of demand driven dispatch in airline hub operations Waldman, Gary L. Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Flight Transportation Laboratory Airlines Production scheduling Logistic distribution Management Cover title June 1991 Also issued as an M.S. thesis, Dept. of Aeronautics and Astronautics, MIT, 1993 Includes bibliographical references (p. 93-94) This thesis explores the use of demand driven dispatch in the hub and spoke environment prevalent in the route networks of major airlines in the United States. Demand driven dispatch is an operational mode where aircraft assignments can be changed in response to variation in demand. A computer program simulated the functions of a revenue management system and an optimal aircraft assignment routine over the course of the passenger booking process. An isolated hub with service exclusively between the hub and 15 spoke cities was assumed. Two series of quantitative studies were done, one looking at the possible profit improvements at various demand levels with demand driven dispatch and the other examining the sensitivity of demand driven dispatch results to when the first and last optimal reassignment of hub aircraft was made in the booking process. In the first series, comparisons were made between results obtained from static aircraft assignments and fully dynamic demand driven dispatch assignments. Several scenarios were simulated. These involved various combinations of demand distribution, demand balance, and booking process assumptions. Booking process sensitivity studies were performed on a small subset of the scenario combinations. A discussion of practical issues which could affect implementation is also included. Results show that demand driven dispatch performance is fairly uniform regardless of the scenario with the best projected yearly profit increases for a major hub and spoke operator of $35-$40 million over the current fixed assignment practice. This occurred at load factors similar to airline historical levels of 65%. The profit increases at normal demand levels were achieved mostly through better aircraft utilization patterns (lower costs) and not revenue enhancement. At higher average load factors demand driven dispatch improvement was less significant but was always positive. Studies on when demand driven dispatch was applied during the booking process showed that major benefits could be gained by evaluating assignments even once as long as this assignment period preceded any significant level of high yield passenger booking requests. 2012-01-06T22:25:51Z 2012-01-06T22:25:51Z 1993 Technical Report 29177303 http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/68114 FTL report (Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Flight Transportation Laboratory) ; R93-3 94 p application/pdf [Cambridge, Mass. : Massachusetts Institute of Technology], Flight Transportation Laboratory, [1993]
spellingShingle Airlines
Production scheduling
Logistic distribution
Management
Waldman, Gary L.
A study of the practicality and profit enhancement potential of demand driven dispatch in airline hub operations
title A study of the practicality and profit enhancement potential of demand driven dispatch in airline hub operations
title_full A study of the practicality and profit enhancement potential of demand driven dispatch in airline hub operations
title_fullStr A study of the practicality and profit enhancement potential of demand driven dispatch in airline hub operations
title_full_unstemmed A study of the practicality and profit enhancement potential of demand driven dispatch in airline hub operations
title_short A study of the practicality and profit enhancement potential of demand driven dispatch in airline hub operations
title_sort study of the practicality and profit enhancement potential of demand driven dispatch in airline hub operations
topic Airlines
Production scheduling
Logistic distribution
Management
url http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/68114
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