Airport checkpoint screening assigns passengers to lanes by risk class, but the dedicated selectee lane is frequently underutilized while primary lanes queue. This paper develops a simulation-based queueing design that reassigns passengers across lanes based on real-time lane occupancy and risk class.
A case study shows the framework increases the probability of accurately identifying high-risk passengers — “true alarms” — by over 4% relative to then-current practice, with minimal impact on overall processing time. The result is a screening configuration that improves security outcomes and resource utilization simultaneously rather than trading one against the other.