Optimal berth allocation with variable job scheduling

Abstract

In this study, the problem of Optimal Berth Allocation, which involves the assignment of ships arriving at the port to the appropriate berths within their time windows, while maximizing the total number of ships served is discussed. The problem is treated as a Variable Job Scheduling Problem and an integer programming model is developed. To contribute to the practical use of the study, the eligibility constraint is taken into consideration. Proving that the model is NP-hard, genetic algorithm is used to approximate the optimal solution. The formulated model is implemented and a dataset is generated. Using this dataset an experiment is conducted by changing the parameters of the genetic algorithm model. The initial run results of the tests are provided.