Optimal assignment of airport baggage unloading zones to outgoing flights

•Developed an optimal assignment model for airport baggage unloading zones.•Minimized assignment cost with considering overlap penalties.•Developed properties to improve solving efficiency of vector assignment problem.•Developed formulations to consider uniformity penalties.•Conducted a case study compared with the methods in literature.

The outbound airport baggage handling system (BHS) consists of a set of unloading zones (chutes) which are assigned to outgoing flights. Airport baggage operations have inherent uncertainties such as flight delays and varying number of bags. In this paper, the chute assignment problem is modeled as a Stochastic Vector Assignment Problem (SVAP) and multiple extensions are presented to incorporate the various design needs of the airport. A real airport outbound BHS is presented. This case study also guided the optimization models’ design process. The performance of the optimization models is compared with the methods used in practice and literature.