Combinatorics on permutation tableaux of type $A$ and type $B$

We give another bijective proof of a result of Corteel and Nadeau. We find a generating function related to unrestricted columns of permutation tableaux. As a consequence, we obtain a sign-imbalance formula for permutation tableaux. We extend the first bijection of Corteel and Nadeau between permutations and permutation tableaux to type $B$ objects. Using this type $B$ bijection, we generalize a result of Lam and Williams. We prove that the bijection of Corteel and Nadeau and our type $B$ bijection can be expressed as zigzag maps on the alternative representation.