A rail-road transshipment yard picture

We develop a methodology for measuring the expected operational performance of the transshipment yard of a rail-road terminal. This includes the derivation of closed-form expressions for quantifying the expected crane cycle time and its variance under completely randomized operations of gantry cranes within its dedicated region. We also provide a method to measure the expected truck waiting times under cranes considering priority rules for truck service. An analysis of the performance measures shows the causes of inefficiencies and congestion sources. Our results show that non-synchronized operations have a notorious impact on transshipment yard performance, handling capacity and congestion. •We present an analysis of cycle time and variance of gantry crane operations.•We provide an analytical model to measure a railroad yard operational performance.•We analyze the main inefficiencies and congestion in rail-road terminals.