Improving maritime inventory routing: application to a Brazilian petroleum case

The crude oil offloading and supply problem (COSP) is a type of operation maritime inventory routing (MIR) problem encountered by petroleum companies. In COSP, the company not only is responsible for the ship scheduling to carry the crude oil from production sites to discharge ports but also must maintain inventory levels at both ports (production and consumption) between safety operational bounds to avoid disruptions in its crude oil production and/or refining processes. We show how to improve significantly the decision-making process in a Brazilian petroleum company using a mixed-integer linear programming (MILP) model to represent COSP. Comparison tests with a current ship-scheduling method adopted in the company indicated that the use of the MILP model increased the transportation efficiency and reduced costs by 20% on average. In addition to the quantitative gains, the use of a MILP model to solve COSP has succeeded when encountering real-life events, such as variation in production or consumption rates, berth unavailability, and changes in the storage capacities at ports.     

Evaluating the effects of bus design on passenger flow: Is agent-based simulation a feasible approach?

In this paper, we propose an agent-based simulation approach that is capable of simulating the flow of passengers on board buses and at bus stops. The intention is that it will be applied during vehicle development to analyze how vehicle design affects passenger flow, and thus also how it affects system performance such as dwell time. In turn, this could aid the developers in making design decisions early in the development process. Besides introducing the simulation tool itself, the paper explores the realism of the data generated by the tool. A number of passenger flow experiments featuring a full-scale bus mockup and 50 participants were carried out. The setup of these experiments mirrored a number of ‘bus journeys’ (regarding vehicle design, number of passengers boarding/alighting at each stop and so on) that had previously been simulated using the simulation tool. When the data from the simulations were compared with the data from the passenger flow experiments, it could be concluded that the tool is indeed able to generate realistic passenger flows, although with some errors when a large number of passengers board/alight. The simulated dwell times were rationally affected by the tested bus layout aspects. It was concluded that the tool makes it possible to evaluate how variations in bus layouts affect passenger flow, providing data of sufficiently high quality to be useful in early phases of vehicle design.     

信号采样理论在交通流检测点布设中的应用

在对交通流检测点布设领域研究应用现状进行分析与抽象的基础上,提出交通流检测点布设本质上属于空间交通流信号采样问题。依据信号采样理论,建立了确定检测点间距或密度的方法与流程,该流程包括空间交通流信号产生、离散傅里叶变换、频谱分析、间距确定、误差分析5个步骤。对高速公路拥挤状态下的仿真分析表明:100 m的检测点间距可以满足对拥挤交通流状态的真实检测,该数值接近于实际应用中的最小值(125 m),说明该理论方法具有较好的实用性。     

基于Q学习的Agent在单路口交通控制中的应用

将Agent技术与Q学习算法相结合,应用到城市交通控制领域中,对单交叉口的交通流进行了控制研究,介绍了路口Agent的结构模型以及基于Q学习算法的学习机制的实现,提出了一种适用于交通控制的奖惩函数。即当红灯相位的饱和度大于绿灯相位的饱和度时,红灯相位的相对警界度在奖惩函数中占主导地位,此时大部分情况下会对Agent进行惩罚;在以后的决策过程中面对类似的交通状态Agent所选择的控制行为更倾向于将通行权切换给下一个相位,反之,Agent所选择的行为倾向于保持当前相位的通行权到下一决策时刻。并通过微观交通仿真软件Paramics对控制算法进行仿真研究,仿真结果表明该方法的控制效果优于定时控制,同时验证了奖惩函数的有效性。     

基于汽车道路作用空间与公路车辆当量换算系数的研究

以运行车辆为质点,提出采用汽车道路作用空间的物理分析方法来研究车辆当量系数换算问题。建立了车辆道路作用空间模型,通过大量试验数据分析和应用随机场论的分析方法,研究确定了汽车在运行过程中所表现出的横向、纵向道路作用空间特性以及与道路、交通和车型等相关因素的定量数值,并由此推算出了基本车辆当量换算系数,和基于不同公路服务水平条件下的车辆当量换算系数。     

基于路网子图空间的交通流平衡分析方法

通过定义路网子图空间,提出了基于路网子图空间的Wardrop平衡原理,建立了相应的交通流平衡分析模型,并通过实例阐释了偏态均衡路网交通流的形成机理与演化过程。研究表明:该模型能够很好地解释包括新路开通期的路网交通流、换乘子图空间路网交通流、收费道路偏好子图空间路网交通流等多种情形下由于网络结构被差异性地认知所形成的偏态均衡路网交通流现象,为多标准下交通流的平衡分析建立了新途径;该分析方法有助于道路网络结构设计与道路网络管理方案的优化。     

“麦莎”台风对苏州河的水位影响分析

该文分析了苏州河水系遭遇“麦莎”台风的雨情和水情,并利用相应实测资料对苏州河水系河网水量模型进行验证计算,检验结果精度较高,在此基础上,分析研究出现状和未来远期规划工况条件下,遭遇“麦莎”台风影响的苏州河沿线高水位变化分布。     

抛石层灌注桩施工新工艺的应用

抛石层灌注桩施工工艺的应用填补了国内灌注桩施工的一项空白,它具有操作简便、确保成孔质量、设备简单、工期短、成本低等特点。取芯注浆是该工艺的核心工序。它的应用为今后同类地质条件下的灌注桩施工提供了经验。