[caster_cp]

One factor that has to be taken into account is the "social" one, i.e. how can we enforce that the ultra-fast amazingly optimal sitting scheme will be used.

Let's conduct a thought experiment. My grandma (that has difficulty hearing) is boarding a plane. Try explaining to her, in a sensible and efficient manner that only the people at the windows should get in first.

Ok, maybe my grandma is an extreme example. But think of a first time flyer. Lots of people would be confused.

Also, as already stated, people that travel together sit side by side. Are you going to split the young couple of newly weds during boarding? Is that really sensible? Or the mother and her five kids?

The main takeaway that I get is that you should let people get in without any pre-ordering. Unless you can devise a socially acceptable way to enforce outside-in boarding, that is. I'm not.

You see, the bottom line for me is that simulations are really valuable, but not taking into account the human factors involving the business, how the people actually consume your product, you can have great ideas that work on excel and flunk marvelously on the market.

[MAGZine]

"Now boarding people requiring special assistance or those with priority seating"

"now boarding seats A and F."

"now boarding seats B and E"...

Seems simple enough. Priority seating would just be a box that you check off, only available to people travelling in groups. Seat these people as far back and as close to a wall as possible.

[goshx]

Sounds simple, but I have yet to be on a flight where nobody misses the guidelines. There are always quite a few people "lost" and most of the time intentionally.

[brownbat]

Even if we just start with the assumption that n% of people will misunderstand, it still strikes me as unlikely that the best algorithm will be the current one.

I think we have the next round of tests though. See how many people you need to randomly swap before Steffen is worse than back-to-front.

[nostrademons]

Also stand-by passengers and people who catch an earlier flight. It used to be that at least one airline (United?) would let you switch planes for free if you asked the gate attendant <10 minutes before door closing and they still had room, so you'd often end up with a few savvy travelers loitering around until the very end of boarding. This hasn't worked the last couple times I tried it - they charge a fee - but I still almost always ask and see what the options are if I get to the airport a couple hours before my scheduled flight and have only carry-on baggage. Once I even managed to switch a 1-stop to an earlier direct flight: I paid the $50 fee but it still ended up cheaper than buying the direct ticket up-front.

[umeshunni]

The article actually addresses some of the cases you mentioned - like families and couples - and proposes exceptions for those. You could conceivably implement a check-in time boarding order assignment algorithm which takes such factors into consideration. This would result in a slightly longer than ideal boarding time, due to congestion in the aisles, but still better than the current scenarios.

[chengiz]

You dont say people with window seats board first. Based on the seat passengers have a zone number on their boarding pass, and you call by zones.

[brownbat]

I've been on a few airlines that make people line up in roughly some order according to a number on a boarding pass. I'm sure a couple people are out of order on every flight, but if the airline is already going through the effort of lining people up in some order, why not make it the best order?

[nvw]

Easy. Print icons/ideograms on tickets, in addition and preferably next to ticket numbers.

Print triangles for window seats, squares for middle seats, circles for aisle seats.

Print arrow up for modulo 4 numbered seats, arrow right for non-modulo 4 even numbered seats, arrow down for modulo 3 numbered seats, and arrow left for non-modulo 3 odd numbered seats.

Everyone gets two and only two easily identified symbols in addiion to their ticket number, which suffice for all of the methods outlined in the article.