Problem Description
A high crane utilization is critical for any type of construction project. The position of lift equipment such as tower cranes determines how quick the jobsite can move material across the site, and can remove the need of renting additional machines as the project moves forward. Construction planners usually decide the position of the tower crane based on convenience for the foundation, access to critical pick-up and drop-off zones and space constraints. In this example, we are trying to find the optimal location for the crane according to predefined zones in our project. Ideally, the crane will be located on a place where it reaches the most floor area as possible, but also we want to maximize the access to pick-up zones (generally located in the ground floor near parking spaces and storage), and drop-off zones which will be predefined as areas within each floor that are ideal for materials to be stored or dropped by the crane as the building goes up.
Creating a Study Model
Creating a Study and Exploring the Outcomes
What's Next -- Extensions & Potential Next Steps
This example explores the question "What is the best place to put a tower crane given certain building characteristics?".
There might be more complex and challenging questions that we could aim to solve using this framework such as:
- How many and how big should my cranes be if I want to minimize on operational cost?
- Where should I place my pickup zone (if possible) given potential locations of tower cranes?
- How does the layout and distribution of my drop-off zones changes the optimal location of the tower crane?
- What is the optimal combination of different crane sizes to achieve minimal cost and maximum utilization in the job site?
Using a parametric and mathematical approach to these kind of problems will give you the ability to explore vast design spaces, find patterns and optimize multivariable problems with the help of computation, genetic algorithms and 3D modeling.
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