Open Access

ARTICLE

Optimal Scheduling of Multiple Rail Cranes in Rail Stations with Interference Crane Areas

Nguyen Vu Anh Duy, Nguyen Le Thai, Nguyen Huu Tho^*

Faculty of Engineering and Technology, Nguyen Tat Thanh University, Ho Chi Minh City, 700000, Vietnam

* Corresponding Author: Nguyen Huu Tho. Email:

(This article belongs to the Special Issue: Optimization Problems Based on Mathematical Algorithms and Soft Computing)

Intelligent Automation & Soft Computing 2024, 39(1), 15-31. https://doi.org/10.32604/iasc.2024.038272

Received 05 December 2022; Accepted 12 April 2023; Issue published 29 March 2024

Abstract

In this paper, we consider a multi-crane scheduling problem in rail stations because their operations directly influence the throughput of the rail stations. In particular, the job is not only assigned to cranes but also the job sequencing is implemented for each crane to minimize the makespan of cranes. A dual cycle of cranes is used to minimize the number of working cycles of cranes. The rail crane scheduling problems in this study are based on the movement of containers. We consider not only the gantry moves, but also the trolley moves as well as the re-handle cases are also included. A mathematical model of multi-crane scheduling is developed. The traditional and parallel simulated annealing (SA) are adapted to determine the optimal scheduling solutions. Numerical examples are conducted to evaluate the applicability of the proposed algorithms. Verification of the proposed parallel SA is done by comparing it to existing previous works. Results of numerical computation highlighted that the parallel SA algorithm outperformed the SA and gave better solutions than other considered algorithms.

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Keywords

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