Optimal Algorithm for the General Quay Crane Double-Cycling Problem

Chung-Yee Lee (), Ming Liu () and Chengbin Chu ()
Additional contact information
Chung-Yee Lee: Department of Industrial Engineering and Logistics Management, Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, Clear Water Bay, Kowloon, Hong Kong
Ming Liu: School of Economics and Management, Tongji University, 200092 Shanghai, China,
Chengbin Chu: Laboratoire Génie Industriel, École Centrale Paris, Grande Voie des Vignes, 92295 Châtenay-Malabry Cedex, France

Transportation Science, 2015, vol. 49, issue 4, 957-967

Abstract: Quay crane efficiency is the key bottleneck for container port productivity. An important issue of container terminal optimization is the quay crane double-cycling problem (QCDCP). For the simple scenario without hatch covers, a two-machine flow shop scheduled model can be formulated that can be solved by Johnson’s rule. For the general QCDCP with hatch covers, the state-of-the-art solution approaches are only heuristics. The computational complexity of the problem, however, remains an open question.This paper focuses on the general QCDCP. We investigate the computational complexity of the problem, by showing that it can be formulated as a flow shop scheduling problem with series-parallel precedence constraints, thus allowing it to be solved polynomially. For ease of implementation, we present an optimal algorithm for the general QCDCP, which is a special and simplified version of Sidney’s algorithm.

Keywords: container ports; quay cranes; double cycling; scheduling (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2015
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (8)

Downloads: (external link)
http://dx.doi.org/10.1287/trsc.2014.0563 (application/pdf)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:inm:ortrsc:v:49:y:2015:i:4:p:957-967

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in Transportation Science from INFORMS Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Chris Asher ().