ABSTRACT

Excess demand for airport facilities is now a global phenomenon. Increasing the capacity of airports so that they can handle more trafc is difcult, partly because it is expensive, and partly because such expansion often encounters environmental problems. As a consequence, there are many airports which face excess demand, some for part of the day, and several, like London’s Heathrow and Frankfurt, for all of the day. Outside the US, capacity at airports is usually rationed by means of a slot system.