Optimising aircraft routing and fleet assignment with flight unit loops: a novel decision unit approach for reducing model complexity
针对航空公司短期飞机航线与机队分配的大规模非线性问题，提出航班单元串和环的概念，构建以最小化航班平均延误影响和最大化利润为目标的集成优化模型，并设计多目标算法求解，为航空公司提供科学决策支持。
Focusing on the optimisation of short-term aircraft routeing and fleet assignment, this study addresses the characteristic of airline operations typically being large-scale nonlinear programming problems. To reduce the model scale, the concepts of “flight unit string” and “flight unit loop” are introduced. Based on these concepts, an integrated optimisation model for aircraft routeing and fleet assignment prioritising flight unit loops is constructed. The model aims to minimise the average delay impact of flights and maximise profit, taking into account the spatio-temporal constraints of flights and daily maintenance requirements. This approach ensures the generation of flight loops and effectively reduces the model scale. Furthermore, a multi-objective optimisation algorithm incorporating greedy strategies, clustering algorithms, and non-dominated sorting genetic algorithms is designed to solve the model. Through experiment analysis, the effectiveness of the model and algorithm is validated, which can provide scientific solutions for airline.