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by Those who find themselves stuck in a blocked aisle while boarding airplanes may have even more to grumble about. "Classier" airlines who employ assigned seating and board the plane starting with the rear-most seats to maintain a sense of order, may actual lengthen boarding times. New analysis, using unorthodox methods, has shown the melee of free-for-all seating to be the more timely method (although window-seats-first seating is also an improvement).
Boarding simulations have traditionally used models including complicating factors such as slow-moving passengers, full overhead bins, and people sitting in the wrong place. However, a group of mathematicians and computer scientists have used mathematics (more commonly applied to the theory of relativity and prime number theory) to replace those factors and model airplane boarding. It appears 'to be the first application of this theory outside physics.'
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While interesting, I wonder just how much time is saved on a 200+ passenger plane. I didn't see any time figures in the articles.
In my experience, the boarding procedures are just shy of being a free-for-all anyway. They usually call a set of rows to start boarding, and before all of that group has gone through the ticket validation point, the next group is queued. It seems to me that they're already pushing people into the gate as fast as possible. I suppose randomization of passengers beyond row groups could help, but I just can't imagine it helping that much. If I missed a time stat somewhere, could someone fill me in?
The reason that randomization would work better from a strictly conceptual point of view is because if you look at one person's boarding process, the longest time that they spend stationary is standing in the isle putting things in the overhead bin and whatnot before sitting down. If you load the plane from back to front, you have a much greater chance of these people holding things up.
Now for the Math. Lets say that we have a plane that seats 60 people, 15 rows of 4, with two being on each side. We then divide that plain into 3 "zones," with each zone being 5 rows, numbered with zone 1 in the back and 3 in the front. If you call for zone one, you have a 20% chance of the first person on the plane being from the row in that zone closest to the front of the plane. While they are putting their stuff away and getting ready to sit down, EVERYONE is waiting behind them to sit further back in the plane. So you've got 19 people waiting on 1 person in the alotted time. Much like jamming 20 bits through a 1-bit bus.
Now if you seat randomly, and take 33.3% from each zone and make them a part of zone 1, and so on until you've got one third of each of the zones from the previous paragraph packed into a zone, you've got the chance for at least three people to be putting up luggage at the same time. Now you've got 17 people waiting on 3 people to get ready in the alotted time. Now your putting 20 bits through a 3-bit bus, which is 3 times as fast as before!
I'm sure that it is wicked more complicated then that, but that is the basic explanation, at least in my head.
From the end of the Nature article,
Most efficient of all would be to avoid all blocking by boarding passengers in a strict sequence, seat by seat. But most people don't like to be controlled to that extent, says Skiena. "Airlines would like to turn around their planes as quickly as possible", he says. "But they don't want to annoy their passengers."
I don't know that it would annoy passengers that much to do this. There are many different ways to do it, most of which would only require pre-boarding organization. For example, here's my solution:
Every ticket could have a section and order number printed on it. Fifteen minutes before boarding, section 1, consisting of the window seat passengers only, is called to the pre-boarding area where the passengers are directed to stand on their order number (arranged on the floor in back-to-front order). When they board, section 2 is called (middle seats) and the same process is followed. Section 3 follows with all latecomers going last.
How inconvenient is that, really? You would have to listen for when they call your section, but you have to do that already. You would have to find your order number and stand on it, but that inconvenience is more than compensated for by not having to worry about being first in line or that grandma in front of you with the oversized carry-on bag she can barely lift. (You just know she's going to be sitting one row in front of you and you'll be stuck in the aisle waiting while she meticulously re-packs her bag after you break the latch trying to help her get it into the over-head compartment.) The only people who have to climb over anyone are those that miss their section, and when the plane unloads, those who stand up first (on the aisles) are those whose carry-on bags were packed last.
The more I think about this, the more I think it would be worth the rough transition period and the extra pre-boarding organization. I know when I fly, I'd pick an airline that was on-top of things and effective over one that was bumbling but stayed "out of my hair."
The problem that you would run into is the variance in arrival times to the pre-pre-boarding area. The other problem is that while it seems extremely convenient for the airline to be able to get everyone ready to go like that, most people would rather sit in their seats until the they are called. To that you COULD answer that you could have seating that was arranged based on the seat you had on the plane, but then you run into the problem of different size planes at the same terminal at the airport.
I think that it is easy to submit preparing the passengers for boarding as a group when we're in the military because we're used to it, but I think if you introduce it into a civilian setting such as an airport, people will get pissed off quickly.
The problem that you would run into is the variance in arrival times to the pre-pre-boarding area.
Why is this a problem? With my schedule, you arrive at the terminal and sit and wait for your section to be called instead of doing the same thing but waiting for your seat range to be called.
most people would rather sit in their seats until the they are called.
That's still what they're doing. I would even venture to say that they would be called up at the same time, as the bottleneck comes at scanning boarding passes. Thus, in the present scheme, your row is called and you go stand in line, while in the new scheme, your section is called and you go stand in line starting on your order number.
With my schedule, you arrive at the terminal and sit and wait for your section to be called instead of doing the same thing but waiting for your seat range to be called.
I interpreted it to mean that all of the passengers would be queued up prior to the plane being ready for boarding so that the boarding process went as fast as possible. So would people that arrive after their section is called go in with the next group and risk disrupting the entire seating process or be forced to wait and board last?
Thus, in the present scheme, your row is called and you go stand in line, while in the new scheme, your section is called and you go stand in line starting on your order number.
You don't think that this would possibly be more coordination then a group of random people is capable of? I understand that it would be a rather easy process to figure out which number you are in line, but you never know. People as individuals are brilliant, but once you get them into a large group they tend to get stupid real quick-like.
If you don't make your section, you wait until last. I was thinking it would be good to make it inconvenient for these late people so they would have some extra motivation to show up on time.
Yes, I agree there would be a rough transition, but people would figure it out quick enough. I think driving is much more complicated, but people pick it up because they have to. Self-checkout lines at the grocery store are another good example; I'm sure there were lots of growing pains in the first few months (there were for me), but the improvement after everyone got the hang of it is noticeable (both in checkout times and in overhead for the store, I'm sure).
I think that those grocery store growing pains are still going on. I stood behind a lady buying a 2-Liter and a bag of chips the other day for like 20 minutes, it was rediculous. I know that I have a generally technical disposition and therefore am at an advantage, but this was rediculous. They should have a self-checkout licensing program where you go take a self-checkout aptitude test. There are some people that just aren't capable of checking themselves out.
I especially like it because I get into this crappy mood sometimes and don't even feel like giving people the polite hello, so I just hit up the self-checkout and voila, no talky.
On the airplane issue, it definately sounds like a fairly solid idea, maybe you should write an article about it and call it "Aircraft Boarding Dynamics." Maybe we can draw a huge crowd like that iPod article did a while back.
Congratulations to me on reaching NR8, more then likely my pinnacle of nerddom.
The only issue with this is that what if a father arrives to board and his five-year-old has the window seat, he's in the middle seat, and his pregnant wife is in the aisle? I can only assume that he would throw a fit, if not totally disregard, the boarding procedures. I think this would probably be true for most any group of people more than 1.
That is a potential problem. I guess they would have to group people like that in a "special needs" category and seat them in either pre or post-boarding.
Another thought I had about boarding issues is that of carry-on luggage, which has got to be the biggest delayer in boarding/evacuating a plane. People are obsessed with getting everything on board because it saves so much time to not have to go to baggage claim. If there was way to return the bags to the customer faster, then the airline could heavily regulate carry-ons and greatly improve boarding times.
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that's why I fly Southwest by mikeforbes :: NR6 :: on 14 December 2005
You know, the other day I tried explaining the two-dimensional Lorentz geometry theory to the Lufthansa lady when she wouldn't let me board before the "Platinum Club" passengers, but she would have nothing of it.
The guy behind me kept trying to excuse her irrationality, saying that she "didn't speak English," but I think she was just being stubborn. Dang Germans.