Jinn-Tsai Wong

Basic concepts for a system for advance booking for highway use

To promote sustainable travel patterns and improve road performance, a highway booking system which can maximize social benefit and regulate road traffic, is described in this paper.

Flexible assignment approach to itinerary seat allocation

This paper proposes a new approach to the optimal allocation of airline seats among itineraries in a network under stochastic demand. Current approaches to network seat inventory control are based on either full assignment or bucket control. Under full assignment, all seats on each flight leg are assigned to a specific single- or multi-leg itinerary. Under bucket control seats are assigned to groups of itineraries. The flexible assignment approach proposed in this paper assigns some seats exclusively to each single- or multi-leg itinerary as in fixed assignment and assigns the remaining seats to groups of itineraries as in bucket control. This paper formulates the flexible assignment approach, develops rules for optimal assignment for a single-fare-class network and proves the superiority of this approach to either fixed assignment or bucket control. A numerical simulation is ised to illustrate the differences in expected revenue among these three methods of seat inventory control for four different demand scenarios.

Exploring the Impact of Introducing Scheduled Flights on Aviation Markets: Experience from Opening of China–Taiwan Nonstop Flights

The commencement of regular nonstop flights between mainland China and Taiwan in December 2008 was expected to increase the flow of traffic across the Taiwan Strait. Travelers would no longer have to stop to change aircraft; the flight between mainland China and Taiwan would be quicker, cheaper, and more convenient. Hong Kong and Macau, formerly the gateways connecting Taiwan to China, would now compete with point-to-point nonstop flights available to cross-strait travelers. The aim of this study was to examine the evolving supply and demand associated with the aviation market between China and Taiwan and to focus on the changes resulting from the introduction of scheduled nonstop flights. Data covering a 15-month period were collected and analyzed by using multilevel models. The results show that despite rapid growth in the nonstop cross-strait air travel market, growth rates are still restricted by limitations set by the Chinese and Taiwanese governments, particularly those routes connecting Taiwan with first-tier Chinese cities. For this reason, some travelers are forced to make a detour through Hong Kong or Macau on their way to China. However, city pairs connecting Taiwan with second- or third-tier Chinese cities have not performed as well as expected, and some markets have even demonstrated a negative trend over time, indicating a shrinking market. The market for cross-strait air travel exhibits clear heterogeneous characteristics in city pairs, which should be considered as governments take the next steps in opening up the market.