Optimal Dredge Fleet Scheduling Within Environmental Work Windows

The U. S. Army Corps of Engineers oversees dredging in hundreds of navigation projects annually, through its fleet of government equipment and through individual contracts with private industry. The research presented here sought to examine the decision to allocate dredge resources to projects systemwide under necessary constraints. These constraints included environmental restrictions on when dredging could take place in response to the migration patterns of turtles, birds, fish, and other wildlife; dredge equipment resource availability; and varying equipment productivity rates that affected project completion times. The paper discusses problem definition and model formulation of optimal dredge fleet scheduling within environmental work windows. In addition, a sensitivity analysis was conducted to provide decision makers with quantitative insights into dredging program efficiency gains that could be realized systemwide if environmental restrictions were relaxed. Opportunities exist to provide decision makers with quantitative insights into how efficiencies might be obtained if targeted research were to show that particular restricted periods could be relaxed without adverse consequences to sensitive and endangered species

Research report (Texas Tech University. Center for Multidisciplinary Research in Transportation)

Report on the performance of Type H Inlets as median drains for divided highways. The study consists of a literature review, experimental results of drain performance, and recommendations for estimation of Type H inlet performance