Continuous decision plan for optimizing budget allocation for dredging projects considering shoaling effect within a multi-year horizon

Dredging is a constant operation to maintain the waterway shipping capacity along the rivers, coastal lines as well as ports and harbors. The goal is to achieve a maximum network capacity to support the regional and national economies within the range of a given budget. Shoaling happens after dredging to partially offset or undermine the dredging benefits. Wisely spending the dredging budget over the selected timeframe for a network capacity by considering the shoaling effect is the objective of this proposed research. This proposal assumes shoaling at each location/section follows a known probability distribution with a given draft. This project aims to improve the previous research by developing an innovative model for potentially systematically considering the route-based draft capacity after dredging. Previous models consider route-based minimum dredging instead. The multi-year decision making process shows compelling advantages over the continued, multiple, single-year, independent decisions. An important feature of the proposal is that it considers the first-year impacts on the remaining years. This project will specially consider interdependency of project effects on the network.

Language

• English

Project

• Status: Active
• Funding: $180000
• Contract Numbers:

  69A3552348331

• Sponsor Organizations:

  Office of the Assistant Secretary for Research and Technology

  University Transportation Centers Program
  Department of Transportation
  Washington, DC  United States  20590
• Managing Organizations:

  Maritime Transportation Research and Education Center (MarTREC)

  University of Arkansas
  4190 Bell Engineering Center
  Fayetteville, AR  United States  72701
• Performing Organizations:

  Texas A&M University, College Station

  Texas A&M Engineering Experiment Station
  1470 William D. Fitch Parkway
  College Station, TX  United States  77845
• Principal Investigators:

  Wang, Bruce

• Start Date: 20240301
• Expected Completion Date: 20260228
• Actual Completion Date: 0
• USDOT Program: University Transportation Centers

Subject/Index Terms

• TRT Terms: Budgeting; Decision making; Dredging; Resource allocation
• Subject Areas: Geotechnology; Maintenance and Preservation; Marine Transportation; Planning and Forecasting;

Filing Info

• Accession Number: 01924914
• Record Type: Research project
• Source Agency: Maritime Transportation Research and Education Center (MarTREC)
• Contract Numbers: 69A3552348331
• Files: UTC, RIP
• Created Date: Jul 23 2024 12:50PM