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"Operational planning system through simulation"
Under the authority of the Port Authority of Amsterdam, Incontrol examined different possibilities to improve the allocation of pilots, tugboats and the largest lock ('Noordersluis') to the incoming and outgoing ships which call in at the port of Amsterdam.
 The result of this research is STAA, a system developed by Incontrol. STAA is an innovative decision support system and planning system to coordinate the 24/7 operational processes and to control the arrival and departure of sea ships.
The Proces
Every year more than 5,000 sea ships call in at the Port of Amsterdam. Due to current economic expectations, this number is increasing heavily and, at the same time, the size of the ships tend to enlarge over time.
Every ship needs a tugboat, a pilot and a passage through the big lock. The following example shows the complexity caused by (only) three ships.
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Ship A makes a journey from the Kruispost (located 5 miles offshore) to the harbor. On it's way, the ship passes the piers at the city of IJmuiden and later on the journey the lock complex. Ships B and C are making exactly the same journey in reverse order from the harbor to the sea.
(1) Ship B uses the big lock after ship A and for that reason:
If Ship A has a delay, ship B has a delay as well.
(2) The same tug which is allocated for ship B, is allocated to ship C and for that reason:
If Ship B has a delay, ship C has a delay as well.
(3) The pilot navigates ship A to the harbor. In the harbor the pilot is transferred to ship C and for that reason:
If Ship A has a delay, ship C has a delay as well.
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This simple example shows that ships are, so to say, connected to each other with invisible lines. If the planning exceeds, ships will be dependant of each other and a certain, in practice a common term, knock-on effect will arise with delay to delay as consequence.
The Control
Many parties are involved in the execution and the planning of this process. Each of these parties operates on different locations spread all over the harbor. The following parties are currently involved in STAA:
- Port Authority of Amsterdam
- Switzer Wijsmuller (tug company)
- Het Loodswezen (pilot association)
The Solution
The Port Authority of Amsterdam and Incontrol have executed an analysis of the complex interdependencies within the harbor and has provided a solution based on three concepts:
- A virtual collaboration working environment
- A common plan of the capacity requirement of tugboats, pilots and the big lock
- The same view of the plan and operational information is shown to all parties
All operational locations are equipped with the STAA Incontrol Center. The STAA Incontrol Center is an internet application based on Microsoft .NET technology.
The STAA Incontrol Center is able to contain an unrestricted number of plans. Every plan contains three sorts of information. First, the plan contains a time-table filled with information of the expected arriving and departing ships. Besides that, every plan has a plan board which contains the journeys of the ships and the allocation of tugboats and pilots. Finally, a plan has an electronic bulletin board. The bulletin board contains messages with operational information and operational agreements.
Decision supportive tools
The STAA Incontrol Center provides three tools:
(1) Conflict detection
Using a simulation model, the STAA Incontrol Center detects where and when a plan has conflicts due to the non-availability of capacity. The user is able to watch the animation of the simulation and receives a status report in the STAA Incontrol Center.
(2) Compare different plans
The same simulation model is also used to compare the robustness of different plans. The question is: how sensitive is a planning for disruptions and what is the relationship with other plans? A robust plan is in many ways preferable over an optimal plan since delays happen frequently due to non-controllable factors (like for instance the weather).
(3) Propose a plan
Using a tailor-made planning engine, the STAA Incontrol Center makes a proposal for the daily plan of the journey of the ships. The plan considers the availability of tugboats, pilots and the lock sequence of the big lock and whether ships are able to call in at the harbor due to the tide. The planning engine considers the fact that tugboats are not only scarce resources, but that the tugboats are moving resources as well. This means that the planning engine considers time and place.
STAA Web server and Database server
The STAA Web Server and Database server, in which all information is stored, are located in the middle of Amsterdam. Just like the STAA Incontrol Center, the STAA Web and Database server are developed in the Microsoft .NET platform. An internet application makes it redundant to build a special network at the client and the application makes it possible to use the system in all places all over the world. For example, the system can be used if somebody brought his own laptop to Tokyo, Japan.
The Method
An important feature while developing an innovative decision support system such as STAA, is the acceptation of the system by the operational people. The core of the method is that Incontrol treated the common practice as a source of experiences and not the cause of the problems. The members of the Incontrol project team were in close contact with all operational people regularly to develop the concepts and ideas of the new system. The members of Incontrol actually attended some night shifts to gain the insight in operational processes they needed to successfully develop the system.
Besides this, Incontrol equipped all operational working stations with the first prototype of STAA in a very early stage of the project. A core group of potential users used this prototype to gain ideas and wishes. A series of prototypes followed before Incontrol completed a final version. In this project, Incontrol did not produce endless piles of documents with specifications of the system. The concepts were presented on easy-reference memos to the board of the Port Authority of Amsterdam, but just as important, to the people who should work with the system.
The entire project extended over nine months. The flexible approach resulted in completing the STAA system within time and budget.
This reference is also available in pdf-format: STAA.pdf.
For more information or if you want to know how we can help you with your challenge, please contact us by e-mail.
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