title: Optimizing the long-term operating plan of railway marshalling station for capacity utilization analysis.
abstract: Not only is the operating plan the basis of organizing marshalling station's operation, but it is also used to analyze in detail the capacity utilization of each facility in marshalling station. In this paper, a long-term operating plan is optimized mainly for capacity utilization analysis. Firstly, a model is developed to minimize railcars' average staying time with the constraints of minimum time intervals, marshalling track capacity, and so forth. Secondly, an algorithm is designed to solve this model based on genetic algorithm (GA) and simulation method. It divides the plan of whole planning horizon into many subplans, and optimizes them with GA one by one in order to obtain a satisfactory plan with less computing time. Finally, some numeric examples are constructed to analyze (1) the convergence of the algorithm, (2) the effect of some algorithm parameters, and (3) the influence of arrival train flow on the algorithm.
authors.affiliation: School of Traffic and Transportation Engineering, Central South University, Changsha 410075, China.
authors.forename: Wenliang
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Zhou
authors.affiliation: School of Traffic and Transportation Engineering, Central South University, Changsha 410075, China ; Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Troy, AL 12180, USA.
authors.forename: Xia
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Yang
authors.affiliation: School of Traffic and Transportation Engineering, Central South University, Changsha 410075, China.
authors.forename: Jin
authors.identifier: 0000-0003-0745-9511
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Qin
authors.affiliation: School of Traffic and Transportation Engineering, Central South University, Changsha 410075, China.
authors.forename: Lianbo
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Deng
mesh_terms: D000465:Algorithms; D057191:Capacity Building; D003198:Computer Simulation; D013997:Time Factors; D014186:Transportation