Interblock crane deployment in container terminals

We consider the problem of scheduling the movements of cranes in a container storage yard so as to minimize the total unfinished workload at the end of each time period. The problem is formulated as a mixed-integer linear program, and the computational complexity of the problem is analyzed. A Langrangian decomposition solution procedure is described. A new solution approach, called the successive piecewise-linear approximation method, is also developed. Through computational experiments, we show that our proposed solution methods are both efficient and effective for large-sized problems.