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Strict Order Boarding Would Get Planes in the Sky Faster
electrostatic writes "In a Nature.com oldie-but-goodie, a physicist says he has solved a problem that costs airlines millions every year: what is the quickest way to get passengers aboard an aircraft? Boarding is a serious issue for airlines, particularly those operating short flights that run several times a day, yet boarding times have steadily increased for decades. Back in 2005 Jason Steffen of the Fermilab in Batavia, Illinois said the method used by many airlines to this day is almost the worst. 'The best way to board, according to the researchers, would be a row-by-row, seat-by-seat, strict order. That would mean everyone lines up, row 25 first. I can't imagine fliers will go for that. Next best, they say, would be boarding all the window seats first, followed by those in the aisle. Obviously that's not practical, at least for couples or families traveling together.'"
It would be faster until some guy arrives 5 minutes later then everyone else and has to go through security and get on the plane, because of the order everyone would have to stop, let him through, reorganize and then go through. In an ideal situation it would be faster but chaos is quicker then order because order can never truly happen.
There is no "disagree" moderation, and troll, flamebait and overrated are not valid substitutes
Well, boo-hoo. I'm so sorry for the First-Class jerks having to be seated last. They get real chairs, plenty of room, and have paid for that. Not to be seated first even though it makes it that much more difficult for everyone else.
This is now the way Southwest boards, and it's quick and rational (as is their "no assigned seating" plan, especially for their typical short flights). Everyone gets a number, and the boarding is in groups of five. United has also tried (and still tries as far as I know) windows first, then middles, then aisles, but the system fails because of familes or others travelling together, all receiving the same boarding group. Also, "elite flyers" board first and screw everything up... United's system works pretty well most of the time though, but the real problem is you can't get everyone ready to board right when they open the doors, so it's never as rational as it should be (eg, some person in row 29 is going to board when row 18 is boarding and cause a traffic jam). Southwest's new system works well because they really don't care when you board or where you sit -- the line up is mostly so frequent flyers and early check-in-ers get the best choice of seats.
Dude, I think I can see my house from here.
Please line up in a tree and maintain the heap invariant while boarding. Thank you for flying nlogn airlines.
The fastest way to board is to have the seating area at the airport be a removable replica of the seating area inside the airplane. Then, when the plane arrives, the entire airplane opens up, the seating area (with passengers) is removed with a gigantic crane-like machine, and the new seating area (formerly known as the airport waiting area) is loaded in. The area formerly known as the airplane seating area is then put into place inside the airport, and becomes the new airport waiting area. Voila, the entire boarding process in 2 minutes.
That's probably the fastest way without resorting to powerful vacuums, but probably not terribly practical. The most practical way would be to build the plane with sufficient space in the aisle to avoid the "fat guy with the large carry-on that clearly doesn't fit into the overhead bin holding everyone up" problem, but they'd never go for that.
So, maybe a giant vacuum (for disembarking) combined with a giant cannon (for boarding) is the best way. We couldn't guarantee seat assignment this way, of course, but if we encased everyone in foam like the stuff in that car in Demolition Man, it should work with a minimum of injuries.
The problem with these researchers is they aren't thinking outside the box enough.
They could shave some time off of the boarding process - but there is way too little cargo space inside the aircraft. For those who travel often (I'm in a commercial jet more often than my car), the early boarding process gives us 'bread and butter' customers a chance to stow our gear, and those who fly once in a blue moon (usually cheap seats) a longer wait. The inefficiency is a perk, if you travel often.
Sure, they could max/min the time better... but... this is not really something that needs fixing.
+++ UGUCAUCGUAUUUCU
What about having a seating area near the gate that duplicates the seating arrangement on the plane?
You require people to sit there in the correct place, and then you can easily pull people out of the temporary seating area in the correct order.
(You would have to make it big enough for any plane type that is going to be serviced at that gate, and then only seats that exist on the plane are used)
Or an even more interesting, but harder to do version: have the seats on the plane be on a "seat sled" that is swapped out, so that people board the sled before the plane is even there, and then you just swap sleds between the plane. You then let the arriving people depart. (Something about having most of the airframe be doors is probably the weakness of this idea). Or you could have more of the stuff be in the sled, like the entire pressurized compartment, including the galley and bathrooms. Call it the "people magazine".
If I have nothing to hide, don't search me
that he is right. Of course the human effect in this loop will throw everything off schedule every time. This math answer to a psychology problem is interesting, but I think that if you avoid the space issues that make boarding a plane a lot like filling a cattle trailer it will all go better anyway. They tell you how to use the seat belts, the flotation devices, even the air cup thingies, and how to smile when you use all of them but they never tell you or show you how to fscking load your luggage in the over head bins. I've traveled quite a lot, and I ALWAYS see some diminutive person struggling, or the average joe trying to figure out how to get a hexagonal object in an square hole. People, in general, are not all cut out to do abstract puzzle solving in 3D domains under pressure. Some people are good at packing to move house, others are not. Same problems for both issues.
What is needed is training. Show people how it is supposed to be done the easiest way and most of them will comply.
Support NYCountryLawyer RIAA vs People
Since all seating is assigned (some airlines notably excepted) the only reason to fight to get on before anybody else is to make sure you've got space in the overheard to store your bag. I was on one flight a couple of years ago where there literally wasn't space in the overhead to store my (relatively) small computer bag (I was seated in a row that had no under seat storage, so anything i had had to go in the overhead). One flight attendant was most insistent that my laptop would have to be gate checked; I protested and another passenger finally volunteered to have his (massive) bag in the overhead gate-checked; I bought him a drink.
I think people would be more than willing to board by row, highest number first, if the airlines would just consistently enforce their rules about how much stuff you can carry aboard. In the winter, overhead space disappears instantly; people stow these huge coats up there along with their bags. And don't get me started about the jerks who throw their bags in the overhead at row 2 and then walk back through an empty plane to site in row 20. Half a dozen of these guys on the plane means everybody up front has to put their bags in the overhead towards the rear of the aircraft, then fight their way back up front through the embarking mob for seating, and THEN wait for everybody else to disembark to get to the rear of the aircraft to recover their bags....
99% of the time when i travel the fuckheads that hold everything up are the soccer moms and their 2 kids and a pram bullshit. and then once your up in the air the little cunts scream and carry on. just to top it off they only take infants because it's free, only it's not free everyone else is paying for it.
the moment there is a no children airline, sign me up.
If you mod me down, I will become more powerful than you can imagine....
What would be faster is if everyone checked their $#@$@# luggage. People hauling their pull along bags down the aisle and then looking for overhead room and hoisting them up is a huge delay. Make them check them all and just bring a backpack or laptop bag on board, plus security checkpoints would go faster with less stuff to scan.
-Xen
1) First seat all the attractive women, evenly spaced with the most attractive furthest back.
2) Allow males to find their own seats.
3) Fill in the gaps with the old and ugly.
4) Store any children in the baggage h.. errr... Special Fun House.
The quickest way to board the plane is with a giant blender and a pump. The only problem you face is having to refund part of the ticket if a toe gets stuck in the blade and doesn't make the flight!
"The best way to board, according to the researchers, would be a row-by-row, seat-by-seat, strict order. That would mean everyone lines up, row 25 first. I can't imagine fliers will go for that. "
I mean really, next thing you know someone would suggest that all fliers take off their shoes, turn over nail clippers, and not carry shampoo or extra lap-top batteries. People would never put up with stuff like that.
Three Squirrels
oh ... I see you've met my brother.
. waterwingz
If the airlines made the announcement "To improve loading times, we request all you rude a-holes who block the isles while taking minutes to stow your luggage and get yourself organized, board last", loading time would be cut in half. If course those self same rude a-holes are going to just ignore it, like they do common courtesy anyway.
They should be able to fill it just as fast. Just open the slides, tilt them up, and slide them in from above.
What?
...is to let people board as a group, but in the latest loading phase that any member of that group belongs to. This applies to almost any phased boarding scheme, including United's window/center/aisle phasing.
The result is that groups have to wait to board together, but they are likely to be slightly more coordinated in staying out of each other's way than three random individuals trying to fill a row in random order.
I once flew around the Soviet Union a few years before the fall of the Berlin wall.
They had a very strictly enforced an order where people in the back of the jet got on last and got off first.
It seems that on at least some Aeroflot models, if you didn't have enough passengers in the front balancing the weight of those in the rear, the plane would tip backwards.
This study reminds me of the old joke about the early days of the space race.
NASA was worried about the effects of hi-G on astronauts, so they hired some ivory-tower types to work on the problem.
About three months later, they came back to NASA and said, "We've solved it!"
The NASA manager in charge asked them to detail their solution.
The head professor said, "OK. First, assume a perfectly spherical astronaut...."
General Relativity: Space-time tells matter where to go; Matter tells space-time what shape to be.
I am surprised that you were modded down. I now have 2 children, but I still remember the days before. There were plenty of times that I wished for no kids or extremely heavy ppl around me. It was the later issue that lead me to fly Midwest airlines whenever possible. They were flying super 80's in 2x2 configs; not quite first class, but close enough for just a little bit more. In fact, I was surprised when frontier airlines chose to remove a row, rather than a column on their new aircrafts. They said that they wanted to fly 100% load factors. But it seems to me that a 3x3 or even better a widebody with a single column missing would easily encourage loads of Americans to fly them.
But there is a good side to all that. If somebody starts an airline like that, it will keep ppl like you off of the flights that I am on with my children. BTW, that is not really a slam. So far, my kids have traveled great, but I have seen other kids not travel great and ppl just gripping left, right, and sideways about it. It gets old.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
Digital seats, digital seat assignments, and digital boarding routines. How about somethign incredibly more simpler and less sophistimicated.
How about loading it back to front, not by seat assignment (which requires human beings to line-up according to rules) but by the order in which those human beings walk onto the craft -- you know, like a freakin' bus. "Timmy, please move all the way to the back of the bus."
Then, instead of controlling the problem of humans within an aircraft each having seat assignments, you get to control the order with which people board the plane. That's a lot easier and amounts to using your airline's stupid reward points to 'reward' people for taking otherwise undesirable seats.
Especially when we're talking about short commuter flights, it's a short flight -- you don't care which seat you have. You do care how long you sit without moving -- you know, just like a bus.
Man, a bus, I talk like I know something. It's been well over ten years since I've been on a bus. But that's not the point. Well, it's not the point here. We're talking about airplanes. I use those on a regular basis. Although I've never described the experience quite like a neighbouring passenger who said she's "made a career out of strapping a plane to my ass". I miss her. She was an advertising or marketing or sales person for a company that I don't remember, on a flight I've forgotten, going somewhere I can't recall, sometime in the last ten years. Maybe fifteen. Maybe five.
""I can't lift this 300-lb carry-on into the overhead..."
Bingo. The problem is that people can't get on and sit down because half the plane is trying to find a place to stowe their carry-on bags.
Which means that the solution, as I've often maintained, is to ban all carry-on luggage with the exception of purses and one briefcase or small backpack per person. Everything else goes through as checked backage. No garment bags. No wheelies. Nothing else.
This also speeds up getting OFF the plane, as everyone isn't now trying to get their 300lb bags down, and also speeds up security as well, since there are fewer bags to scan and x-ray and manually search. It wasn't bad when just the stewies did it. Now 2/3rds of the plane is trying to "save time" as well, and it's just not working.
Any sect, cult, or religion will legislate its creed into law if it acquires the political power to do so.
To translate a very good but somewhat too diplomatic reply...
Some passengers can lift a bag into the overheads and some can't.Some passengers think that "one carry-on bag up to 20 pounds" means "three carry-on bags, 60 pounds each."
Some passengers are children. Some passengers are infants.Some parents do very well controlling their children. Others allow theirs to run around the aisle while everyone is trying to board.
Some passengers are drunk.And some passengers delay the flight by sitting in the bar blissfully ignoring all the increasingly irritated pages from the gate agents.
Some passengers are in groups trying to sit together. Some passengers are dumb as a box of rocks.These are redundant, especially on the sort of short flights where turn times are critically important. You will live if you have to be separated from your wife/"friend"/kissing cousin/codependency object for one hour. If you won't, that's fine too, since natural selection needs to go to work on you.
Overhead space is limited, so the place where you stow your stuff may or may not be over your seat.Thanks to the passengers with three 60-pound carry-on bags, the place where you stow your stuff may well be in the hold. The problem is that you, and the other 10 last passengers to get on, had to walk the entire length of the plane forward and backward in order to figure that out.
An airliner aisle is barely wide enough for two non-obese people to pass each other, without bags in tow.Nevertheless, it's a very convenient place for people to fiddle around in their bags, socialize, ask where row 13 is without noticing that they are by row 7 and the next row is row 8, fluff pillows, and prepare carry-on fast food meals for consumption. Evidently, the aisle also promotes a strange affliction where people using it for all these convenient purposes are unable to perceive the 140 passengers impatiently waiting to get by.
And sometimes, disorganization sets in.Especially on weekends and at major holidays, most fliers are rank n00bs.
I live in China. As anyone who has visited here knows, the concept of a queue or waiting in line doesn't exist. When the doors open, there is a unorganzied hoard pushing madly to get into the plane. On top of this, people totally ignore the carry-on rules and routinely have several large boxes. It is pure chaos.
And yet, my china flights always board much faster than my US flights. The last flight I took was a fully-loaded 747 from Shanghai to Beijing. It boarded in about 10 minutes. A similar flight in US I had a few months ago took almost 30 minutes to board. I think there is something to be said for highly motivated chaos.
On a related note, I've never been able to figure out exactly why going through security in the US takes so long. As near as I can tell, the China and US airports do the exact same screening - the liquids in the bag, laptops out, no shoes, etc. - plus a passport check - and still it is on average 3x faster. So strange...
- davevr
and we would like to welcome our new passengers, the previous customers of FIFO Airlines, which went out of business due to time delays
GIGO Airlines has offered to honor our coupons, but you don't want to fly with them if you want get where you really wanted to go
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
I wonder if dual boarding (ie, boarding from the front and the back at the same time) would be cost efficient for them. They'd obviously need almost 2x as many staff to cover both entrances, but maybe that cost is less than having the plane delayed due to boarding problems.
I'm always annoyed that I can't disembark via the back exit when I'm getting off (I always get stuck in the rear of the plane), and it irks me to be standing in a long queue to get on the plane when I know they could effectively double the bandwidth by opening up the back entry. I guess they don't want people walking on the tarmac unless they absolutely have to.
United may have a relatively efficient boarding process, but it doesn't help if the plane shows up too late for boarding time to matter.
United's problem is that their gate personnel are sloppy about the boarding procedure. They'll call "boarding group 1", which these days is nominally the rear of the plane, but they aren't strict about who they let through at that point. Then, after 20-or-so passengers board, they'll call group 2, even though there are plenty of 1s still queued up.
If they just followed their own procedure, and if the flight crew was more ruthless about telling people to step out of the aisles, it would be oh-so-much smoother.
The worst are people that cram around the boarding area and / or try to board when it's not their turn. Sometimes these people get waved through, but sometimes not. And if they don't get turned around to wait for their turn they end up blocking the people that could be getting seated in the back of the plane.
I always thought it would be great to have sort of a "bad boarder" or detention area to corral people off to the side of the gate that tried boarding at the wrong time. Just a nice little waiting area that they direct you to stand in and wait. And then once the entire plane has boarded you and all your non-boarding in time friends can join. And then everyone could give them a nice Nelson-style "Hah hah" laugh as they walked bye.
I gotta have more cowbell.
Europeans might use real butter. In America we would have used artificially flavored oil like the kind we cherish on our movie popcorn. There would be no way to stop passengers from just licking the delicious oil off though.
I think more efficient would be to just tranquilize all passengers and quickly have them sorted and loaded into the plane like luggage.
“Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
There are two big reasons to carry on luggage.
One, it saves you 20-30 minutes of waiting around for your bags to get off the plane. (And in rare circumstances, it can save you an hour or more when, for example, your bags can't come off the plane because of lightning.)
Two, and more important to business travelers, is it preserves flexibility. If you've carried on your luggage, and something odd happens to your flight, you can take your bag, get off, and get on another plane. If your bag has been checked, you then have to figure out how you're going to get your bags that are coming in on a different flight.
paintball
So far, I haven't seen any technological solutions to this? Why? Isn't this Slashdot? :)
Something I'd like to see is boarding passes as devices. You check in, and you get a token, a gadget, which has a little battery, a little display, some simple flashing lights, and wifi connectivity to the airport system.
So you need to get through security, and you're a bit late, and you have no idea who in front of you is more late than you, or if it's ok to skip the line. But if the airport has these boarding passes, you can build in a priority tracking system. Is your boarding pass blinking green? If so, skip the line to security. Is it not blinking? Fuck off, stand in line like everyone else. Big signs at security saying that you should let people through with blinking tokens.
Ok, you didn't get a gate number at check-in, so you have to stand around looking at the monitors in the airport. You can't go anywhere else, because the gate you need to be at might be far away, so no dawdling. If the boarding passes are connected, they can be updated in real-time, make a little beep, and display your gate on itself.
Also, passengers that are late or forgot their departure time and hold up the flight (graaoorrrgghh!!) could have their boarding pass remind them about where they should be. Make the pass beep and blink more, the more late the passenger is. No more relying on people listening to the speakers, which they don't.
Finally, boarding. So, making people board in the right order is hard. With a little blinkenlights it'll be easier. Is your pass blinking green? Then go board. Is it red? Fuck off, wait until your turn. No more big groups of boarding (passengers on row 44 to 28, please board, bla bla bla), you can individually signal each passenger that he or she should board, making sure to fill the plane up from the rear.
A better plane/airport design is needed, if the passenger cabin area was modular and removable, then all passengers could be "preboarded" and "postdisembarked". This way passenger loading schedules would be totally independent of planes arrival and departure. Before the plane arrives at the gate the departing passengers and their carry-on luggage would be seated and luggage stored in the cabin module. Once the plane lands the arriving passenger cabin module would be removed and taken to a gate to disembark, and the departing passenger cabin could be loaded onto the plane. The departing cabin modules would be loaded through the nose of the plane, pushing the arriving modules out the back as the arriving modules are loaded. Consider it a "plug and play" method of passenger loadeing. It should take no more time to change passenger loads than removing the freight in the cargo section of the plane.
Given the herd mentality of people, any attempts to put some structure around the boarding process are doomed to failure. People, as individuals, may be smart but throw them together at an airline gate, they collectively become dumb as stumps. You can paint circles on the carpet outside the gate with the seat assignments stenciled in them and tell everyone to stand on the spot corresponding to their seat assignments and they'll still get it wrong. People will arrive late or children will be separated from their parent or some asshole will simply refuse to cooperate.
The other problem in boarding is carry-on luggage. This will always cause huge delays in boarding as people struggle to find space in the overhead bins and to cram their oversized suitcase into a space half the size. Eliminating carry-on would solve this but would cause mass insurrection.
Nope. I just don't think it is possible to organize efficient boarding given the current way the process works and given the nature of people. It sure would be nice though.
Patrick Doyle
I mod down every jackass who puts his moderation policy in his sig. Oh, wait a sec....
All children below age 10 should be part of checked baggage.
Mod Karma -1: I sed bad wurds. If I cep my mouf shut, I wud be at riyses.