Guidelines for designing simulation building blocks

Instinctively, it seems better to support decision making by simulation studies carried out with domain specific simulation building blocks, than by simulation studies that start without the knowledge captured in these building blocks. However, only a limited number of project examples using simulation building blocks exist, which showed improved results as a result of the use of building blocks. We identified a number of requirements to overcome the problems in complex simulation studies. We believe that these requirements can be met by using building blocks and by carrying out the simulation studies in a predefined way. First of all a good building block architecture should be developed that supports the complexities in simulation studies. In this paper we will describe a design approach that in our point of view results in a usable set of building blocks. A proof of concept of the design approach and the architecture are given using a case for passenger modeling at airports.