Cost Reduction of Missed Connecting Flights Through Optimized Gate Assignment
Open Access DepositedMissed connecting flights cause significant disruptions for airlines andpassengers, leading to increased costs such as rebooking, passenger accommodations, and operational inefficiencies. This research addresses the issue by developing an optimization model for gate assignment that prioritizes late arriving flights and assigns gates that minimize passenger transit times between connections. The data set of flight data included 10,000 arrivals to and 10,000 departures fromMCO, which resulted in 281,850 data points per percentage of transfer passengers. Additionally, a separate set of arrivals, consisting of 121 flights from August 27, 2024, were downloaded from the MCO website to be used for validation, containing the actual assigned gates for those flights. The model was tested using historical data from Orlando International Airport(MCO) and evaluated against current gate assignment methods. By incorporating factors such as flight delays, gate proximity, and passenger transfer patterns, the optimization model demonstrated a significant reduction in missed connections and associated costs. Statistical analysis confirmed the model's effectiveness, with a mean reduction in missed connection costs of 32%, exceeding the hypothesized value of 10%. This research contributes to airport logistics by proposing a novel, cost-effective solution to gate assignment challenges, with implications for improving airport efficiency and passenger satisfaction. Recommendations for future research include developing a more robust costfunction to accurately represent the cost of missed connections. Additionally, future research may want to investigate including resource allocation as a potential reason for missing connections along with expanding the research to include other airports globally to evaluate general effectiveness. Finally, investigation of expanding the minimum connection time under investigation to determine the minimum time where a missed connection is not likely to happen would have significant impact in airport planning.
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