This dissertation is concerned with a facility layout and traffic flow network design problem where the focus is on assigning activities to locations in order to minimize the congestion within a circulation system. This dissertation first presents a series of mathematical models of the facility layout problem in which stochastic congestion within the movement system is modelled. The models can be used to assist the design and placement of departments or activities within a facility or surrounding environment where the congestion of the pedestrian or customer traffic flow is of major concern. Numerical examples are provided to illustrate the difference between the various formulations. Second, a new heuristic algorithm called STEP, Sample Test pair-wise Exchange Procedure, to solve these complex problems is developed. With its straightforward approach, the algorithm can solve large-scale Quadratic and Stochastic Quadratic Assignment Problems with efficient computing times and excellent solution performance. Computational experience for solving many test examples is presented. Extensive work has been carried out for selecting and evaluating appropriate facility network design configurations. This is done by evaluating the performance of the alternative network designs such as star, grid, and ring topologies in terms of customers' sojourn time in the system. Finally, the dissertation concludes with a discussion of open problems and directions for future research.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:UMASS/oai:scholarworks.umass.edu:dissertations-8618 |
| Date | 01 January 1993 |
| Creators | Li, Wu-ji |
| Publisher | ScholarWorks@UMass Amherst |
| Source Sets | University of Massachusetts, Amherst |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | text |
| Source | Doctoral Dissertations Available from Proquest |
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