A hybrid system for facility layout by integrating simulation and ant colony optimization

In this paper, we integrated simulation and ant colony optimization for solving the facility layout problems in public service building. The optimization goal was to minimize the pedestrians' walking time between facilities in the building. By means of VISSIM, a microscopic simulation engine, the proposed system could simulate and calculate the change in the total walking time of the pedestrians as a result of locating the facility layout. The near-optimal layout can be derived by iterations and the pheromone update in the ant colony optimization. Locating the facilities in a public service building requires a lot of time, cost and human labor. Therefore, it is impossible to "try multiple layout portfolios" onsite. This paper applied and calibrated the simulation engine VISSIM to fit the real-life processes of pedestrian behaviors and facility operations in the space. This approach allows us to easily predict the operation situation of each layout portfolio at a very low cost. We further selected an airport terminal to evaluate the feasibility of the system. The results indicated that the proposed system could save pedestrians' walking time and improve the operation and service efficiency.