# Ground Support Equipment Scheduling The vehicle routing problem of airports. Ground support equipment (GSE) includes fuel trucks, baggage tractors, pushback tugs, catering trucks, water/waste service vehicles, de-icing rigs, and passenger buses. Each turnaround needs a specific combination of these assets in a specific sequence. The scheduling challenge: limited vehicles, spatially distributed stands, time windows dictated by the turnaround sequence, and coupling between stand allocation and vehicle routing. Where you park the aircraft determines how far the fuel truck drives. How far the fuel truck drives determines whether it makes it to the next flight on time. Most airports dispatch GSE reactively. A vehicle finishes its current task, gets assigned the next one based on proximity or queue order. This is simple but leaves 30-50% efficiency on the table compared to optimized scheduling, particularly in reducing vehicle idle time, travel distance, and downstream delays. The research shows that optimizing stand allocation and GSE scheduling together (rather than sequentially) produces significantly better outcomes. Stand allocation results directly constrain GSE routing options, and GSE capacity should feed back into stand allocation decisions. Few systems do this in practice. Electrification of GSE is an emerging trend that adds charging schedule constraints to an already complex problem. An electric baggage tractor needs to return to a charging station at predictable intervals, which tightens the feasible routing space. Related: [[Stand and Gate Allocation]], [[Aircraft Turnaround]], [[Simulation-Based Optimization]], [[Airport Operations MOC]] --- Tags: #deeptech