Expansion Planning at Container Terminals

Container terminals are highly complex systems where various processes need to interoperate smoothly in order to offer the required level of service at competitive prices. Hence, with changing logistics network structures, higher expected service standards, and increasing transportation demands, container terminals continuously need modification. When resources at a terminal get scarce, an expansion provides additional space, e.g. to improve superstructure and/or to increase the yard size. The presented literature review examines the process of expansion: With which methods and tools are the expansion plans developed and which requirements are inherent to expansion projects? Here, the perspective of both industry and academia on this planning problem is of interest. The examined literature suggests that throughout the project many factors influence the final result. The first draft often changes several times before a project is completed. This is reflected in the tools which are used to create valuable input at intermediate steps during the planning phase, such as layout design tools, ship handling simulators, and logistics simulation. Logistics simulation is the only reported quantitative method to estimate future operation characteristics. The link between the different software solutions remains weak – for each a representation of the container terminal needs to be kept up to date. Hence, in future the coupling of simulation with other software tools seems promising.