Research Progress and Hot Frontier Analysis of Container Terminal Transportation Operations

In ocean transportation, contractual and operational relationships may be asynchronous. A case in point is the relationship between a customer requiring inbound container storage and a container terminal operator. The customer may store inbound containers in a container terminal and will pay the ocean carrier a specific storage fee, without establishing any contractual relationship with the terminal operator. After collecting the storage fee, the ocean carrier will then pay the container terminal operator for the storage of the inbound container. In this article, we study two-level inbound container storage pricing problems involving a container terminal operator and an ocean carrier in two different inbound container storage contract systems: the free-time contract system and the free-space contract system. In each contract system, we propose a two-stage pricing game model. We derive the optimal decisions for the container terminal operator and the ocean carrier. Analysis about the coordination of the two kinds of contract system is also provided. Numerical studies are conducted to compare the outcomes of the two systems for the ocean carrier and the container terminal. The results of computational experiments reveal that the free-space contract system is a preferable strategy for busy container terminals in terms of traffic control.

Each container terminal has attempted to improve its performance through effective strategic and tactical management. Therefore, performance measurement is needed due to the long waiting time of the service process within container terminal operations. We have utilized the system dynamics methodology to assess container terminal performance. Container port enterprises have been influenced by governance, environmental and social components, therefore, the management of those components has significant impacts on the service port's performance. Therefore, the objective of the research is to model the dynamic performance of the container terminal with consideration of environmental, social, and governance components. Furthermore, this dynamic model has presented practical value for increasing the performance of the container terminal operation under capacity constraints. The case study focused on the Indonesia Port Corporation of Jakarta, Indonesia. As a result, the research has identified the influence of container terminal decision variables, such as emissions, employee satisfaction, and good corporate governance, on container terminals, implying their significance in reducing berthing time as the main indicator of container terminal performance. The novelty of this research is to provide a system dynamic model which combines tactical and strategic levels for container terminal operation.

The increasing pressure to reduce carbon footprint in the logistics sector has driven significant interest in sustainable practices within container terminal operations. This paper focuses on modelling and optimizing the carbon footprint of a container terminal operator by analyzing key operational processes. Existing literature extensively covers carbon footprint reduction strategies in logistics; however, specific optimization models tailored to container terminal operations remain limited. This study employs a quantitative approach and scenario-based simulations to assess the impact of different operational strategies on carbon emissions. Key research questions refer to the primary sources of carbon emissions in container terminal operations and how can operational adjustments and technological interventions optimize carbon footprint reduction. Findings suggest that electrification of handling equipment, process automation, and energy-efficient scheduling significantly reduce emissions. The study provides a structured framework for terminal operators to assess and enhance sustainability efforts, contributing to the broader discourse on green port operations.

Because container vessels spend a large portion of transportation time in ports, it is essential to improve the productivity of various handling activities in port container terminals. Also, because port construction requires a large amount of investment, it is important to efficiently utilize the internal resources of container terminals. This chapter introduces various operations in container terminals and decision-making problems that require support by scientific methods. Models and methods in previous researches are reviewed and classified according to their characteristics.

This book provides an overview of the operation of container terminals and the associated risks with such operations. These risks are often ignored or not properly investigated by both scholars and practitioners. Operational Risk Management in Container Terminals explores and discusses the decision rationales and the consequences for these operational risks handling process, with in-depth investigation on the container terminals in the Asia-Pacific region. The topics covered include the history and development of the container terminals, the operation of the terminals and risk incurred, the risk-management theories and concepts, rationales and consequences of the risk decisions in the container terminal operations, common practices and recommendations on terminal operational risk handling.

The major characteristics of ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning) are an enterprise-wide system that covers all the business functions and information resources, integrated database, built-in best industry practice, packaged software and open architecture. ERP enables reduction of system development time, flexibility, standardization of workflow and effective business planning capability. ERP is mainly for the manufacturing industry. However, the principles of ERP can also be applied to container terminal operating systems. This paper presents an ERP system approach for a container terminal. It has clustered the workflow of a container terminal and analysed the business process to generate the best workflows. The integrated database is designed to eliminate redundancy and keep integration. The core of ERP for container terminal is the planning facility such as berth planning and yard planning. The planning capability is very tightly coupled with data flow from client entities such as shipping companies. The ERP can handle the existing problems of container terminal operation that are mainly caused by lack of integration of a whole information resource in a container terminal, ad-hoc and poor planning capability, disconnected and incorrect data from client companies. The ERP approach can not only resolve the problems of container terminals but also promote adoption of information systems for container terminals in the world that have not yet implemented terminal operating systems.

International major container terminals are trying to expand automation facilities in order to dominate the competition and grow as central harbors. Recently, system design and development were put underway to fully integrate automation systems in container terminals. This is because it can focus on improving the efficiency of the yard operations in container terminals and facilitates integration with other container terminal operation processes. Automation in the container terminal business today is essential to better serve customers and improve profitability. Real-time position and status of container handling equipment (CHE) have been required for more efficient terminal operations and consequently higher productivity. This study examined the real-time location and status of the container terminal automation equipment using DGPS in container terminals, and reviewed the components and functions of the container terminal automation yard equipment systems that developed, applied, and operated the automation systems. In addition, this study compared the existing yard system and the automation yard system and presented application methods. Also, the results revealed that the productivity of the container terminal and the efficiency of the transportation equipment can be further increased when the optimal yard automation transportation equipment system is used to efficiently operate the transportation equipment, which is the core equipment of the container terminal.

Assessing the impact of the Boankra inland container terminal on the operational performance of the seaports of Ghana

Nowadays, approximately 90 per cent of the world's cargoes are moved by vessels, and the majority of general cargoes are transported in containers. Accordingly, a container terminal becomes one of the important nodes in the global supply chain network and it is important to make container terminals operate efficiently. Meanwhile, after the terrorist attack on September 11, 2001, the US Government has proposed and implemented several approaches to improve security systems, including container security inspection operations. These operations may make an inspection center a bottleneck in container terminal operations. In this article, we analyze the container terminal berth allocation and inspection operation systems to find out a proper service rate so that potential bottlenecks can be avoided. We derive lower bounds of the service rate of the inspection center for the deterministic processing time case and perform simulation experiments to validate the lower bounds under stochastic processing time settings.

PurposeBuilding on the resource-based view (RBV) perspective of common resources, the objective of this paper is to empirically examine the impact of container terminals' common resources (i.e. government support and terminal resources) on resource bundling strategies and subsequent effect on service performance.Design/methodology/approachUsing cross-sectional survey data collected from a sample of 216 respondents of Indonesia's container terminals, this study used structural equation modeling (SEM) to test the hypothesised relationships between common resources, resource bundling strategies and service performance.FindingsGovernment support and terminal resources (personnel and physical), both as sources of common resources when bundled effectively, are found to have positive and significant effect on terminal service performance. The resource bundling strategies fully mediate the relationship between container terminals' common resources and service performance.Practical implicationsThe study introduces the notion of common resources to container terminal managers in contrast to the valuable, rare, inimitable and non-substitutable (VRIN) types. It is recommended that appropriate resource bundling strategies can turn the common resources into VRIN resources that can be used to obtain desired service performance.Originality/valueRBV theorists suggest that resources that are VRIN types can be the source of competitive advantage. However, the resources can also be common, basic and valuable, a fact that is rarely investigated in the literature. These common resources can be bundled judiciously with other pre-existing resources to create VRIN resources. This research enriches the RBV by empirically validating that VRIN resources are embedded within various common resources bundling strategies.

Container Terminals (CTs) are continuously presented with highly interrelated, complex, and uncertain planning tasks. The ever-increasing intensity of operations at CTs in recent years has also resulted in increasing environmental concerns, and they are experiencing an unprecedented pressure to lower their emissions. Operational Research (OR), as a key player in the optimisation of the complex decision problems that arise from the quay and land side operations at CTs, has been therefore presented with new challenges and opportunities to incorporate environmental considerations into decision making and better utilise the ‘big data’ that is continuously generated from the never-stopping operations at CTs. The state-of-the-art literature on OR's incorporation of environmental considerations and its interplay with Big Data Analytics (BDA) is, however, still very much underdeveloped, fragmented, and divergent, and a guiding framework is completely missing. This paper presents a review of the most relevant developments in the field and sheds light on promising research opportunities for the better exploitation of the synergistic effect of the two disciplines in addressing CT operational problems, while incorporating uncertainty and environmental concerns efficiently. The paper finds that while OR has thus far contributed to improving the environmental performance of CTs (rather implicitly), this can be much further stepped up with more explicit incorporation of environmental considerations and better exploitation of BDA predictive modelling capabilities. New interdisciplinary research at the intersection of conventional CT optimisation problems, energy management and sizing, and net-zero technology and energy vectors adoption is also presented as a prominent line of future research.

This article provides an overview of the applications of operations research (OR) techniques to marine container terminals. The article begins by providing a summary of marine container terminal operations. Following this, a series of decision problems are identified, to which OR techniques have been applied. These include quayside, yard, and landside decision problems. In each section, the problems, technical approaches, and outcomes are described. With respect to quayside decision problems, the specific problems addressed include determination of quayside equipment types, berth allocation, quay crane allocation and scheduling, and operational planning and real‐time decisions related to transportation equipment. Yard decision problems include yard design, storage space allocation, and task assignment for yard handling equipment. Landside decision problems include design of the terminal's landside connection, transport planning, and real‐time control of landside operations. The article provides an overview of the state of the practice. The reader will gain an understanding of the nature of decision problems in marine container terminals, how OR techniques have been used to address these, and the operational improvements made possible through the application of OR techniques to this problem area.

The competitiveness among container terminals is growing due to the positive growth of containerised shipping. The ability to provide efficient services very much depend on the overall efficiency of the container terminal. However, the operation of the container terminal is complex and consists of many subsystems such as the berth and yard. Moreover, the planning and decision making of the berth and yard are usually conducted separately, not as a whole. Therefore, with the lack of integration between these two major subsystems, terminal managers fail to see the impact of the decision made at the berth to the yard and vice versa. This paper presents the application of system dynamics simulation into capturing the operation processes of the berth and yard. The system dynamics model is able to enhance the understanding on the interdependency and relationship between these two subsystems, thus assisting the terminal managers in decision making.

This study introduces the concept of microgames to support situated learning in order to foster situational awareness (SA) of planners in seaport container terminals. In today's complex working environments, it is often difficult to develop the required level of understanding of a given situation, described as situational awareness. A container terminal represents an important, complex node in the multimodal transportation of goods. Many operations have to be planned in order to ensure a high performance of the whole system. To evaluate the relation between SA and planning task performance, the authors conducted tests with 142 participants. They evaluated the role of SA in integrated planning activities, and the playability and usefulness of the microgame. In conclusion, the authors can state that SA is very conducive to integrated planning tasks in container terminal operations. The microgame approach allows for an enjoyable game activity, while providing a meaningful situated learning experience towards SA.

(1) Background: The reliability of port equipment is of significant interest to industry stakeholders due to the economic and logistical factors governing the operation of maritime container terminals. Failures of key equipment like quay cranes can halt operations or cause economically significant delays. (2) Methods: The impact assessment of these disruptive events is conducted through terminal activity modeling and discrete-event simulation of internal processes. The system’s steady-state or transient condition, induced by disruptive events, is statistically assessed within a set of scenarios proposed by the authors. (3) Results: The Heidelberg–Welch and Geweke tests enabled the evaluation of steady-state and transient conditions within the modeled system, which was affected by the reduced reliability of container-handling equipment. (4) Conclusions: The research findings confirmed the usefulness of modeling and simulation in assessing the impact of equipment reliability on maritime container terminal operations. If the magnitude of the disruptive event exceeds the terminal’s absorption capacity, the system may become blocked or remain in a transient state without the ability to recover. This underscores the necessity of analyzing the reliability of critical handling equipment and implementing corrective maintenance actions when required.