A Solution Approach to the Daily Dockworker Planning Problem at a Port Container Terminal

Ivana Vukicevic Bisevac,Natasa S Vidic ,Katarina S Vukadinović

doi:10.1155/2021/2359279

Ivana Vukicevic Bisevac, Natasa S Vidic + Show 1 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.1155/2021/2359279

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Abstract

This study focused on vital resources at port container terminals such as quay cranes and dockworkers. We studied the impact of incorporating the dockworker assignment problem (DWAP) into the quay crane assignment problem (QCAP). The aim of this study was to formulate and solve an integrated model for QCAP and DWAP, with the objective of minimizing the total costs of dockworkers, by optimizing workers’ assignment, so that the ships’ costs due to the time spent in the port are not increased. We proposed an integrated solution approach to the studied problem. Our proposed model has been validated on an adequate number of instances based on the real data. Obtained solutions were compared with the solutions obtained by the traditional sequential approach. It was demonstrated that, for all solved instances, our proposed integrated approach resulted in a reduction in the total costs of dockworkers. The major contribution of this study is that this is the first time that these two problems were modeled together. The obtained results show significant savings in the overall costs.

Highlights

Maritime container transport has a key role in international trade
Constant increase in maritime container transport and the larger capacity of container ships imply greater transshipment demand in container ports [2, 3]. Resources such as berth and quay cranes (QCs) are essential in port container terminals (PCTs); they affect the capacity of the PCT and ship’s turnaround time [4, 5]. e availability of these resources is considered to be of utmost importance for PCT operators
Prior to any ship’s arrival, a PCT operator prepares an operation plan for each ship, based on the agreement with the shipping company and information received from the shipping companies and agents. e most important information consists of the number of containers that need to be unloaded/loaded from/to the ship as well as the ship’s stowage plan and the expected time of arrival (ETA). e ETA depends on many factors such as times spent in previous ports, travel times, weather conditions, and tides

Summary

Introduction

Maritime container transport has a key role in international trade. Increase in maritime container transport arises from the growth of international trade of general cargo [1]. Constant increase in maritime container transport and the larger capacity of container ships imply greater transshipment demand in container ports [2, 3] Resources such as berth and quay cranes (QCs) are essential in port container terminals (PCTs); they affect the capacity of the PCT and ship’s turnaround time [4, 5]. Dockworker assignment problem (DWAP) determines the assignments of workers to all container handling equipment. Dockworkers involved in both ship and housekeeping activities at PCTs make up to 80% of the total PCT workers.

Literature Review

The Problem Description

Mathematical Formulation

A Solution Approach to the Studied Problem

Findings

Numerical Experiments