Dynamic Resource Allocation: A Flexible and Tractable Modeling Framework

This paper presents a binary optimization framework for modeling dynamic resource allocation problems. The framework a) allows modeling flexibility by incorporating dif- ferent objective functions, alternative sets of resources and fairness controls; b) is widely applicable in a variety of problems in transportation, services and engineering; and c) is tractable, i.e., provides near optimal solutions fast for large-scale instances. To justify these assertions, we model and report encouraging computational results on three widely studied problems - the Air Traffic Flow Management, the Aircraft Maintenance Prob- lems and Job Shop Scheduling. Finally, we provide several polyhedral results that offer insights on its effectiveness.