Article
A model for performance evaluation and sensitivity analysis of seaport container terminals
In the last decades, the growth of the containerised freight demand has led to a fast development of seaport container terminals. As an evidence of the relevance and of the interest that such intermodal terminals have reached, consider the significant amount of existing scientific works facing the problem of optimising their performances at operative, tactic, and strategic levels. In this framework, the present paper provides a model to face the problem of finding the best typology, and number, of resources for a given seaport container terminal. Evidently, on one hand, such problemis subject to “static” constraints due, for instance, to budget, manpower and space limitations, and on the other hand, to “dynamic” constraints that rise when the sequence of operations in the terminal, and the relevant timing, are taken into account. The paper is organised as follows: after a brief bibliography review, the proposed PN and (max,+)-algebra models are introduced. Then, some simulation results and the relevant sensitivity analysis are discussed.