Collaborative 4-Dimentional Trajectory Optimisation for High-Density Flow Corridors

Flow corridors are novel types of flexible tube-shaped airspace developed to accommodate the rapid growth in air traffic. In the context of 4D-trajectory-based operation (4D-TBO), given the temporal-spatial characteristics of the airspace, it is crucial to ensure that the workload in high-density corridors does not significantly increase due to additional time constraints. Therefore, it becomes imperative to explore more efficient and reliable methods for generating 4D trajectories in these new airspace prototypes. This paper proposes a multi-aircraft optimisation method aimed at maximising system-wide benefits within flow corridors. Specifically, based on a collaborative decision-making (CDM) mechanism with an emphasis on negotiation capabilities required by the new air traffic management system, we focus on developing a collaborative optimisation process treated as a pure-strategy game and establishing a collaborative flight mechanism as a decision criterion. We employ a distributed auction algorithm with a distributed computing structure to find a weak Pareto-Nash equilibrium that guarantees individual preferences while improving throughput and fuel economy. We demonstrate our approach through numerical experiments conducted in one of China’s busiest en-route areas. The results show significant improvements in throughput and fuel economy without compromising safety while maintaining computational performance even with increasing fleet size.