A Constraint-Based Interactive Train Rescheduling Tool

C. K. Chiu, C. M. Chou, Jimmy Ho-Man Lee, Ho-fung Leung, Y. W. Leung

Abstract: In this paper, we formulate train rescheduling as constraint satisfaction problem and describe a constraint propagation approach to tackle it. Algorithms for timetable verifications and train rescheduling are designed under a coherent framework. We define two optimality criteria that correspond to minimizing passenger delay and the number of station visit modifications respectively for rescheduling. Two heuristics are then proposed to speed up and direct the search towards the optimal solutions. The feasibility of our proposed algorithms and heuristics are confirmed with experimentation using real-life data.