Abstract: In the actual operation process of the export container yard, pre-marshalling is one of the bottlenecks that constrain the operation efficiency of yard cranes. In order to improve the operation efficiency of the export container yard and reduce the processing time of the shipment, the real-time pre-marshalling is adopted to reduce the impact of marshalling and optimize the scheduling of multi-yard cranes in the export container yard. Due to the fixed operation sequence of containers waiting for lifts and the constraints of non-crossing and safe distance among yard cranes, the real-time pre-marshalling is investigated, as well as considering the waiting time constraints of internal container trucks. A mixed integer programming model with a penalized objective function is proposed to minimize the total waiting time of internal container trucks. Based on the characteristics of the problem, a hybrid harmony simulated annealing algorithm is designed to obtain the walking path of each yard crane and a real-time pre-marshalling scheme. In the numerical experiments, compared with the scheme without considering the real-time pre-marshalling, the FCFS scheme and the lower bound, the effectiveness of the crane scheduling model and the algorithm considering the real-time pre-marshalling is validated, and a reference is provided for the crane scheduling in export container yard.

Key words: real-time pre-marshaling, multi-yard cranes scheduling, export container yard, hybrid harmony simulated annealing algorithm