Patent ID: 7248963

Claim:
A method for managing the flow of a plurality of aircraft at an aviation resource, based upon specified data and operational goals pertaining to said aircraft and resource and the control of aircraft arrival fix times at said resource by a system manager charged with managing said resource, said method comprising the steps of: collecting and storing said specified data and operational goals, processing said specified data to predict an initial arrival fix time for each of said aircraft at said resource, specifying a goal function which is defined in terms of arrival fix times and whose value is a measure of how well said aircraft meet said operational goals based on achieving specified arrival fix times, computing an initial value of said goal function using said predicted initial arrival fix times, utilizing said goal function to identify potential arrival fix times to which said arrival fix times can be changed from said predicted, initial arrival fix times so as to result in the value of said goal function indicating a higher degree of attainment of said operational goals than that indicated by said initial value of said goal function, if said utilization step yields a goal function whose value is higher than said initial goal function value, defining requested arrival fix times to be those arrival fix times associated with said higher goal function value, if said utilization step does not yield a goal function whose value is higher than said initial goal function value, defining requested arrival fix times to be said predicted, initial arrival fix times, communicating said requested arrival fix times to said system manager to determine whether authorization may be obtained from said system manager for said aircraft to use said requested arrival fix times, if said arrival fix times authorization is obtained, establishing said requested arrival fix times as the targeted arrival fix times of said aircraft, if said arrival fix times authorization is not obtained, continuing to use said goal function to identify potential arrival fix times which can be communicated to said system manager until arrival fix times authorization is obtained.