Recent progress in air traffic flow management: A review

With the burgeoning expansion of air transportation, the imbalance between airspace capacity and demand is significantly prominent around the world. Air traffic flow management (ATFM) represents a crucial management concept aimed at managing the flow of air traffic in a manner that minimizes delay and maximizes the use of the entire airspace. Despite the concerted efforts of organizations such as IATA, CANSO, FAA, CAAC, and Eurocontrol, which have convened numerous workshops and organized diverse ATFM seminars to constantly update the technology and operational standards, the potential for improving the capacity provision remains significant. Therefore, in recent years, stakeholders and scholars have been relentlessly dedicated to simplifying the problem and optimizing the solution. This paper undertakes a critical appraisal of the recent advancements in this domain, with a particular emphasis on the latest strides and innovative research methodologies. Specifically, the review expounds upon the novel methodologies that have been employed in ATFM research, offering a comprehensive analysis of their comparative advantages in comparison to the present methodologies. Moreover, we have encapsulated recent groundbreaking works and outlined prospective avenues for future research. To the best of our knowledge, this represents the first comprehensive literature review systematically evaluating the latest progress in ATFM research over the past eight years.