Operations and Supply Chain Management Commons^™

The Effect Of Four Decades Of Deregulation On Competition And Productivity Of The U.S. Freight Transportation Industry, Seungjae Shin

Theses and Dissertations

This study reviews the competition and productivity of the U.S. freight transportation industry for the past 41 years. This study investigated the trends of HHI market concentration index values and labor productivity values of rail and truck sectors and tried to find any relationships between the two values in the separate periods before and after the abolishment of the ICC. This study also investigated how the existence of a regulatory body impacted productivity of the freight transportation industry by using a Cobb Douglas production function on annual financial statement data in the U.S. stock exchange market. This study found that: …

Investigating The Effect Of Knowledge Of Environmental Implications On Generation Z Vehicle Choice In Last Mile Delivery Service, Mitchelle Atungulu

Supply Chain Management Undergraduate Honors Theses

Consumer knowledge has a significant impact on consumer behavior and choice, where specific types of knowledge influences consumer shopping and purchasing decisions. As concerns about the environment and businesses operations’ effect on the environment grows, there has been various calls for facilitating increased consumer awareness on environmental issues; with the intent of this knowledge serving to influence consumer decision making in a manner that is viewed as favorable for environmental sustainability. With the substantial growth of ecommerce, one of the decisions that consumers more frequently make is that of delivery service choice as they make online purchase transactions. Various aspects …

Union Pacific Strategic Audit, Maureen O'Hara

Honors Theses

Union Pacific is the largest domestic railroad in the United States, responsible for nearly all of the rail-based shipping in the 23 states making up the Western two-thirds of the country. The company provides a crucial link in the global supply chain. By utilizing internal and external analysis tools, this report seeks to understand how Union Pacific’s business model and strategies have led them to create and sustain competitive advantages against other big competitors in the transportation industry. The analysis utilizes tools such as PESTLE, Porter’s Five Forces, and SWOT analyses. Following the application of the analysis, strategic recommendations are …

An Investigation Into Dysfunctionality Within Intermodal Transportation With A Minor Focus On Refrigerated Containers, Austin Burgess

Supply Chain Management Undergraduate Honors Theses

This paper will contain a discourse regarding intermodal transportation, with a focus on refrigerated containers. It will also give insight into the current issues facing the intermodal market with a selection of suggestions on how to address them. The discourse will take factors such as cost, service, reliability, capacity, the characteristics of the different modes of transportation, and several other factors into consideration. This shall be accomplished through a qualitative interview series conducted with involved parties with different perspectives. Additionally, quantitative data gathered from industry and governmental resources will assist in the analysis. The output of this paper will be …

An Empirical Analysis Of Factors Affecting Autonomous Truck Adoption, Christopher Mondy

Dissertations

Autonomous vehicles have the potential to revolutionize the transportation industry. The segment of truck transportation is no exception. Autonomous vehicles have the potential to improve trucking safety, to increase shipping velocity, and to decrease costs. Additionally, autonomous trucks could be an important tool to help alleviate the ongoing driver shortage that the trucking industry is contending with.

Autonomous truck adoption is not guaranteed. Transportation equipment decisions are market-based, and autonomous trucks must present a compelling business case to transportation professionals. As such, it is imperative to understand the decision-making factors that drive transportation solution adoption, and how autonomous trucks could …

Traffic Congestion In F.C.T: Demand And Supply Approach, Ibrahim Abdul, Salihu Habibu Mohammed Gani, Ibrahim G. Umaru

Bullion

This study examined traffic congestion in Abuja metropolis, F.C.T.- Nigeria using demand and supply approach. The study adopted survey research design. Primary data was collected using questionnaires. Descriptive statistics was used to analysed the data with the aid of tables and graphs. It was discovered that as a road reaches its capacity, each additional vehicle imposes more total delay on others than they bear, resulting in excessive traffic volumes. Congestion is mainly due to the intensive use of automobiles, whose ownership has spread massively in the F.C.T. in recent decades. The study revealed that traffic congestion causes serious consequences in …

Bonipak Trucker Lounge Improvements, Lauren M. Reade

Agricultural Education and Communication

Bonita Packing Company, also known as Bonipak, has been a produce grower and shipper in the Santa Maria Valley for nearly 90 years and has contracts with customers all over the United States and Canada. Since 1932, the family owned and operated business has maintained steady growth as the population continues to rise all while making it a goal to uphold their family values and maintain their deep roots within the community. Transitioning into a fourth generation family farm, the Bonipak team hopes to continue to promote growth and maintain a positive reputation within the community and beyond. With multiple …

A Post-Brexit Transportation Scenario Analysis For An Agri-Fresh Produce Supply Chain, Amr Mahfouz, Declan Allen, Amr Arisha, Ralf Elbert, Michael Gleser

Conference papers

The ever-increasing demand for fresh and healthy products initiated an urgency for effective planning for Agri-Fresh Produce Supply Chains (AFPSC). However, AFPSC faces many challenges, including product vulnerability to market disruption and limited shelf-life. In case of a no-deal Brexit (i.e., the UK leaving the EU without an agreement), trade between Ireland and the UK will most probably be subjected to customs control. In effect, transportation delays and products deterioration rates will increase. Based on interviews with an Irish AFPSC forwarder, a simulation model was developed to investigate different systems' dynamics and operating rules under different delay patterns on the …

Commercial Space Transportation: A Simulation And Analysis Of Operations Impacts On The United States National Airspace System And Airline Stakeholders, Janet K. Tinoco, Rodrigo Firmo, Chunyan Yu, Mohammad Moallemi, Carlos Castro, Todd Waller

Publications

Agenda:

• Background on space launch activity
• Research problem and objective
• Methodology
• Results
• Implications
• Future research

Analyzing The Impact Of Public Transit Usage On Obesity, Zhaowei She, Douglas M. King, Jacobson Sheldon Sheldon

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

The objective of this paper is to estimate the impact of county-level public transit usage on obesity prevalence in the United States and assess the potential for public transit usage as an intervention for obesity. This study adopts an instrumental regression approach to implicitly control for potential selection bias due to possible differences in commuting preferences among obese and non-obese populations. United States health data from the 2009 Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System and transportation data from the 2009 National Household Travel Survey are aggregated and matched at the county level. County-level public transit accessibility and vehicle ownership rates are …

Electric Vehicles With A Battery Switching Station: Adoption And Environmental Impact, Buket Avci, Karan Girotra, Serguei Netessine

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

The transportation sector's carbon footprint and dependence on oil are of deep concern to policy makers in many countries. Use of all-electric drive trains is arguably the most realistic medium-term solution to address these concerns. However, motorist anxiety induced by an electric vehicle's limited range and high battery cost have constrained consumer adoption. A novel switching-station-based solution is touted as a promising remedy. Vehicles use standardized batteries that, when depleted, can be switched for fully charged batteries at switching stations, and motorists only pay for battery use. We build a model that highlights the key mechanisms driving adoption and use …

Humanitarian Logistics Network Design For An Effective Disaster Response, Soumia Ichoua

Soumia Ichoua

In this paper we address the problem of pre-positioning emergency supplies prior to a disaster onset. The goal is to ensure a fast and effective response when the disaster strikes. Pre-positioning of emergency supplies is a strategic decision aimed at determining the number and location of local distribution centers as well as their inventory levels for emergency supplies. These decisions must be made in a highly disruption-prone environment where a timely response is vital and resources are scarce. We present and discuss a scenario-based model that integrates location, inventory and routing decisions.

On The Allocation Of Exclusive-Use Counters For Airport Check-In Queues: Static Vs. Dynamic Policies, Mahmut Parlar, Brian Rodrigues, Sharafali Moosa

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

In this paper we propose a static policy for the optimal allocation of a fixed number of exclusive-use check-in counters dedicated to a single flight. We first provide the motivation for considering the static policy by showing that the dynamic policy already available in the literature suffers from the curse of dimensionality. The objective is to minimize the (expected) total cost of waiting, counter operation, and passenger delay costs which we show to be convex in the number of counters allocated. In those cases where the passenger delay cost is difficult to estimate, we propose an alternative formulation and minimize …

On Export Intermodal Transportation Problem, Supriya Arun Jadhav

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This thesis investigates a logistics problem facing companies that export their products to other countries. The problem is called export intermodal transportation problem. In the export intermodal transportation problem, goods ordered by overseas customers need to be transported from production plants or warehouses of an export company to the customers destinations overseas. The transportation involves using multiple transportation modes such as trucks and rails for the inland portion and ocean liners for the overseas portion, and its objective is to have the goods moved and the cost minimized subject to various constraints. Cost can be minimized by combining orders from …

Robust Storage Assignment In Unit-Load Warehouses, Marcus Ang, Yun Fong Lim, Melvyn Sim

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

Assigning products to and retrieving them from proper storage locations are crucial in minimizing the operating cost of a unit-load warehouse. The problem becomes intractable when the warehouse faces variable supply and uncertain demand in a multi-period setting. We assume a factor-based demand model in which demand for each product in each period is affinely dependent on some uncertain factors. The distributions of these factors are only partially characterized. We introduce a robust optimization model that minimizes the worst-case expected total travel in the warehouse with distributional ambiguity of demand. Under a linear decision rule, we obtain a storage and …

Empirical And Analytical Essays On The Relationship Between Inventory And Transportation, Rodger David Swanson

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation examines the relationship between inventory cost (IC) and transportation cost (TC). The association of the two has been recognized for over a hundred years; accordingly, managers and academics have believed that these costs have offsetting properties such that combinations of inventory and transportation expenditures can be altered to fit different strategic objectives. However, the behavior of this relationship in practice has not been tested. The essays of this dissertation examine this relationship through multiple theoretical lenses and with multiple data sets. Essay 1 examines aggregate IC and TC in the United States from 1960-2009. This period coincides with …

An Integrated Decision– Making Approach For Improving European Air Traffic Management, Yael Gruksha-Cockayne, Bert De Reyck, Zeger Degraeve

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

We develop a multistakeholder, multicriteria decision-making framework for Eurocontrol, the European air traffic management organization, for evaluating and selecting operational improvements to the air traffic management system. The selected set of improvements will form the master plan of the Single European Sky initiative for harmonizing air traffic, in an effort to cope with the forecasted increase in air traffic, while maintaining safety, protecting the environment, and improving predictability and efficiency. The challenge is to select the set of enhancements such that the required performance targets are met and all key stakeholders are committed to the decisions. In this paper, we …

Dynamic Allocation Of Airline Check-In Counters: A Queueing Optimisation Approach, Mahmut Parlar, Sharafali Moosa

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

This paper was motivated by an observation in an international airport with regard to allocation of resources for check-in counters. In an exclusive check-in counter system, each flight has a dedicated number of counters that will be open until at least a half-hour before the scheduled departure of that flight. Currently, in many of the airports around the world, the decision to open or close check-in counters is done on an ad hoc basis by human schedulers. In doing so, the schedulers are almost always forced to perform a balancing act in meeting the quality of service stipulated by the …

Chrysler Leverages Its Suppliers' Improvement Suggestions, Janet L. Hartley, Bertie M. Greer, Seungwood Park

Management Faculty Publications

We examined Chrysler's SCORE (supplier cost reduction effort) supplier-suggestion process from the perspectives of Chrysler and its suppliers. Chrysler used SCORE to save over $2 billion and to build collaborative relationships with its suppliers. In our study, we observed four elements in Chrysler and its suppliers' organizations that contributed to SCORE'S success: (1) designating a process champion, (2) engaging suppliers in the process, (3) motivating em ployees, and (4) facilitating evaluation and implementation. Companies designing a supplier suggestion process should consider ways to reduce delays during evaluation, to minimize the number of low value suggestions, and to involve the entire …

Evaluation Of The Performance Of The Cooperative Logistics Supply Support Arrangement For Rokaf, Mansik Hur

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis examines the performance of the Cooperative Logistics Supply Support Arrangement (CLSSA) for Republic of Korea Air Force (ROKAF). As one of the biggest FMS customer countries, ROKAF buys a substantial portion of its weapon systems from the U.S. Government and relies on the follow-on supply support from the source of acquisition. Because of the advantage of the CLSSA program for its timely support to foreign countries, the CLSSA has been the preferred method of follow-on supply support for FMS customer countries and its magnitude and coverage are being increased. To find out the level of supply support for …

An Examination Of The United States Air Service's Logistics Operations, Andrew W. Hunt

Theses and Dissertations

This historical study details the U.S. Air Service's logistics operations at home and abroad in an attempt to determine the relationship between the process and more recently established logistic principles. The information in the study was collected through an extensive review of both first hand accounts and historical compilations of the nature of World War I aviation logistics. Information regarding the production of the De Haviland DH-4 and Liberty Engine serve as the primary case examples of the operation of the logistics system. The established principles required for comparison were extracted from the writings of a number of expert military …

Hsus Exposes Livestock Transportation Cruelty

Close Up Reports

After a massive investigation covering nine months, twenty states, and more than 20,000 miles, The HSUS has documented that every day and every night, thousands of cattle, pigs, sheep, chickens, and other animals are being crowded, beaten, electrically shocked, trampled--or even killed--during miserable journeys that ultimately end at the slaughterhouses of this country.

Animals are injured during loading, then forced to negotiate dark truck interiors, steep ramps, narrow doorways, sharp turns, and slippery flooring. They are loaded so hurriedly that they knock down or climb onto those animals ahead of them and are crowded so tightly that they injure or …