Collman, A. and Chia, J. (2016) Hundreds Stranded, Passengers Sleeping in COTS: TSA Security Lines of up to THREE HOURS Cause Chaos at Chicago O’Hare as National Staff Shortage at Airports Makes Thousands Miss Flights.

has been cited by the following article:

• TITLE: Application of the Queuing Theory in Characterizing and Optimizing the Passenger Flow at the Airport Security

  AUTHORS: Mengjiao Wang

  KEYWORDS: Queuing Theory, Poisson Process, Gumbel Extreme Value Estimation, Hybrid Poisson Model, Markov Chain

  JOURNAL NAME: Journal of Applied Mathematics and Physics, Vol.5 No.9, September 15, 2017

  ABSTRACT: This paper presents mathematics models that describe and optimize the passenger flow at the airport security checkpoints by applying the queuing theory. Firstly, a Poisson process is used to estimate the flow of passengers waiting for going through the security. Then, the Poisson distribution is combined with a multiple M/M/s model. Following that, an arrival model (passengers’ arriving at the checkpoints preparing for security examination and departure) with Gumbel extreme value estimation is described that predicts the busiest time in the busiest airport. Real case data collected from several major airports worldwide is used for creating a hybrid Poisson model to generate the simulation of passenger volume. At last, Markov Chain theory is applied to the analysis to randomly simulate the flow of enplaned passengers again, and the results of these two simulations are compared and discussed, revealing that the hybrid Poisson model is the more accurate one. After successfully characterizing the passenger flow mathematically, two methods for optimizing the passenger flow are then provided in two different respects: one is bypassing passengers and creating an express pass; while the other one promotes Pre-Check service application.