Technical Note—A Dynamic Programming Framework for the Global Flow Control Problem in Air Traffic Management

Abstract

This paper presents a network model which can serve as a framework for generating optimal global congestion-relieving strategies for the flow control problem in air traffic management. The general network model presented here addresses the global problem of optimally combining a number of local strategies to relieve multiple interdependent occurrences of congestion. While several algorithms and techniques have been or are being developed which deal with congestion at one air traffic control element for one time period, the actual flow control problem is concerned with congestion in a dynamic setting occurring at a number of different elements which are interrelated in a complex manner. The network model presented here is designed to work with the Enhanced Traffic Management System (ETMS) project under development at the Transportation Systems Center (TSC) for the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA).