Multi-hour, multi-traffic class network design for VP-based wide-area dynamically reconfigurable ATM networks

The virtual path (VP) concept has been gaining attention in terms of effective deployment of ATM (asynchronous transfer mode) networks in recent years. In this paper, we discuss a multi-hour, multi-traffic class network (capacity) design model for providing specified quality-of-service in dynamically reconfigurable ATM networks. Our approach is based on statistical multiplexing of traffic within a traffic class by using a virtual path for the class and deterministic multiplexing of different virtual paths, and on providing dynamic bandwidth and reconfigurability through the virtual path concept depending on traffic load during the course of the day. We show that, for test problems based on realistic network data, our approach does between 6% to 20% better than a local shortest path heuristic in terms of network cost. We also show that considering network dynamism through variation of traffic during the course of a day by doing dynamic bandwidth and virtual path reconfiguration can save between 10% to 14% in network design costs compared to a static network based on maximum busy hour traffic