Comparison of AHP and FAHP for Selecting Yard Gantry Cranes in Marine Container Terminals

The time that containerships or transportation trucks spend in marine container terminals for loading and unloading their cargo is a real cost scenario which affects, not only the smooth operation of ports, but also affect the overall cost of container trade. The operators of shipping lines and container terminals are required to realize the importance of this issue and the costs associated with dealing long queues of ships and trucks at loading or discharging ports. This paper introduces the concept of the classical Analytical Hierarchy Process (AHP) together with the Fuzzy AHP (FAHP) to help the decision makers in their judgments towards implementing costly loading and discharging facilities at their container terminals. The main objective of this study is to provide a decision-making tool and also to introduce the concept of the Multiple Attribute Decision-Making (MADM) technique by using and comparing both of the AHP and FAHP techniques for solving the problem of selecting the most efficient container yard gantry crane amongst three alternatives including Straddle Carriers (SCs), Rubber Tyred Gantry Cranes (RTGs), and Rail Mounted Gantry Cranes (RMGs) by incorporating the quantitative and the qualitative determining attributes into the problem. Both of the AHP and FAHP analyses in this study have shown that RMG, RTG, and SC systems are the best operational alternatives, respectively.