{"id":339,"date":"2014-05-08T00:04:39","date_gmt":"2014-05-07T22:04:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.swarm-intelligence.it\/wordpress\/?p=339"},"modified":"2014-08-07T11:19:14","modified_gmt":"2014-08-07T09:19:14","slug":"southwest-airlines-route-troubles","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.swarm-intelligence.it\/wordpress\/southwest-airlines-route-troubles\/","title":{"rendered":"Southwest Airlines route troubles"},"content":{"rendered":"<div style=\"padding-bottom:15px; padding-top:2px;\" class=\"hupso-share-buttons\"><!-- Hupso Share Buttons - https:\/\/www.hupso.com\/share\/ --><a class=\"hupso_toolbar\" href=\"https:\/\/www.hupso.com\/share\/\"><img src=\"https:\/\/static.hupso.com\/share\/buttons\/dot.png\" style=\"border:0px; padding-top: 5px; float:left;\" alt=\"Share Button\"\/><\/a><script type=\"text\/javascript\">var hupso_services_t=new Array(\"Twitter\",\"Facebook\",\"Linkedin\");var hupso_background_t=\"#84FF5E\";var hupso_border_t=\"#FFE959\";var hupso_toolbar_size_t=\"medium\";var hupso_image_folder_url = \"\";var hupso_twitter_via=\"SwarmStrength\";var hupso_url_t=\"\";var hupso_title_t=\"Southwest%20Airlines%20route%20troubles\";<\/script><script type=\"text\/javascript\" src=\"https:\/\/static.hupso.com\/share\/js\/share_toolbar.js\"><\/script><!-- Hupso Share Buttons --><\/div><p lang=\"en-US\">Some years ago \u00a0Southwest Airlines got trouble with cargo operations. Indeed many planes were using only 7% of their cargo space and at some airports there wasn&#8217;t enough capacity to accommodate scheduled loads of freight, leading to bottlenecks.<\/p>\n<p lang=\"en-US\"><!--more--><\/p>\n<p>Employees loaded freight onto the first plane going in the right direction but these operations led workers to spend an unnecessary amount of time moving cargo from a plane to another plane.<\/p>\n<p>To solve its problem, Southwest researcher looked at the way ants forage, using\u00a0simple rules, finding efficient routes to food sources.\u00a0They built an algorithm to calculate the best route in each situation.<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_351\" style=\"width: 510px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.swarm-intelligence.it\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/06\/trails.jpg\"><img aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-351\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"wp-image-351 size-full\" src=\"http:\/\/www.swarm-intelligence.it\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/06\/trails.jpg\" alt=\"trails\" width=\"500\" height=\"375\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.swarm-intelligence.it\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/06\/trails.jpg 500w, https:\/\/www.swarm-intelligence.it\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/06\/trails-300x225.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 500px) 100vw, 500px\" \/><\/a><p id=\"caption-attachment-351\" class=\"wp-caption-text\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/vincealongi\/442717793\/in\/photolist-F83zp-9xzR6s-cjJ9sA-8vMeDA-7dANop-5xB7mM-ay9egY-afoRwv-fP1yco-frZhcd-FmdrX-4DY8C1-dgqR5c-Fmdsp-5UUMJ2-6qGoeU-azfcM6-8d8cb9-8d8d1j-frFRA8-3QTajA-6YuEXA-4PJgEs-3qLwt2-dmCSxS-dPHbY7-dPBzwT-dPHcML-dPBzbP-dST8A1-7xUf7B-7BVd19-bpmR6Z-iW7m5-iW6TM-cqDXB1-9svYg3-bpmDdi-9f4wJQ-bpmDeX-c8iS2S-bpmHoF-8NE9mA-H863n-4hrufV-c8iSpq-9Qd4R5-6D5frS-dT1HRh-dSV8t2\" target=\"blank\"> CC License by Vince Alongi<\/a><\/p><\/div>\n<p>When they applied this algorithm\u00a0to Southwest\u2019s problem,\u00a0discovered a more efficent way to manage the cargo. In some case \u00a0it could be better to leave a cargo on a plane headed initially in the wrong direction.<\/p>\n<p>For example, to send a package from Chicago to Boston, it was more\u00a0efficient to leave it on a plane heading for Atlanta and then Boston than to take it off and put it on the next flight to Boston.<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_314\" style=\"width: 510px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.swarm-intelligence.it\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/05\/SouthwestCase.jpg\"><img aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-314\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"wp-image-314 size-full\" src=\"http:\/\/www.swarm-intelligence.it\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/05\/SouthwestCase.jpg\" alt=\"Southwest routes\" width=\"500\" height=\"339\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.swarm-intelligence.it\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/05\/SouthwestCase.jpg 500w, https:\/\/www.swarm-intelligence.it\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/05\/SouthwestCase-300x203.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 500px) 100vw, 500px\" \/><\/a><p id=\"caption-attachment-314\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Southwest routes<\/p><\/div>\n<p>Applying the ants foraging system to its cargo Southwest has lowered freight transfer rates by as much as 80% at the busiest cargo stations, decreased the workload for the people who move cargo by as much as 20%, and dramatically reduced the number of overnight transfers.<\/p>\n<p>Research into the behavior of social insects has helped several companies, including Unilever, McGraw-Hill, and Capital One, to develop more efficient ways to schedule factory equipment, divide tasks among workers, organize people, and even plot strategy.<\/p>\n<p>To explore deeper the topic you can read this article by\u00a0<strong>Eric Bonabeau and Christopher Meyer<\/strong>\u00a0published\u00a02001\/05 (Harvard Business Review) :\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/hbr.org\/2001\/05\/swarm-intelligence-a-whole-new-way-to-think-about-business\/\" target=\"_blank\">Swarm Intelligence: A Whole New Way to Think About Business<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p lang=\"en-US\" align=\"LEFT\">\n<div style=\"padding-bottom:15px; padding-top:2px;\" class=\"hupso-share-buttons\"><!-- Hupso Share Buttons - https:\/\/www.hupso.com\/share\/ --><a class=\"hupso_toolbar\" href=\"https:\/\/www.hupso.com\/share\/\"><img src=\"https:\/\/static.hupso.com\/share\/buttons\/dot.png\" style=\"border:0px; padding-top: 5px; float:left;\" alt=\"Share Button\"\/><\/a><script type=\"text\/javascript\">var hupso_services_t=new Array(\"Twitter\",\"Facebook\",\"Linkedin\");var hupso_background_t=\"#84FF5E\";var hupso_border_t=\"#FFE959\";var hupso_toolbar_size_t=\"medium\";var hupso_image_folder_url = \"\";var hupso_twitter_via=\"SwarmStrength\";var hupso_url_t=\"\";var hupso_title_t=\"Southwest%20Airlines%20route%20troubles\";<\/script><script type=\"text\/javascript\" src=\"https:\/\/static.hupso.com\/share\/js\/share_toolbar.js\"><\/script><!-- Hupso Share Buttons --><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Some years ago \u00a0Southwest Airlines got trouble with cargo operations. Indeed many planes were using only 7% of their cargo space and at some airports there wasn&#8217;t enough capacity to accommodate scheduled loads of freight, leading to bottlenecks.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":350,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[51],"tags":[9,30,21,33,47,32,12,18,48],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.swarm-intelligence.it\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/339"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.swarm-intelligence.it\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.swarm-intelligence.it\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.swarm-intelligence.it\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.swarm-intelligence.it\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=339"}],"version-history":[{"count":11,"href":"https:\/\/www.swarm-intelligence.it\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/339\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":413,"href":"https:\/\/www.swarm-intelligence.it\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/339\/revisions\/413"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.swarm-intelligence.it\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/350"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.swarm-intelligence.it\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=339"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.swarm-intelligence.it\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=339"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.swarm-intelligence.it\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=339"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}