Optimizing the number of deployed yard cranes in a container terminal

Abstract Container terminals play an essential role in the current global supply chain, and their efficiency influences businesses throughout the supply chain. One of the most critical decisions in the operation of container terminals is the number of deployed rubber tyred gantry (RTG) cranes to handle the containers. The RTG crane is the main equipment that handles containers in the stacking area of many container terminals worldwide. Every shift, container terminal operators decide how many RTG cranes are needed to stack and retrieve containers. This decision, if made optimally, can significantly improve the daily throughput of terminals and dramatically reduce port congestion. This article aims to determine the optimal number of RTG cranes in a container terminal by formulating the problem as a mixed-integer linear program. Our proposed formulation can find optimal solutions efficiently, usually in less than a second. The results show that the workload, storage capacity, and shift duration significantly influence the optimal number of RTG cranes.