The Transport Game - A Tool for Teaching the Basics of Transport Decision Proficiency
Authors
Dag Fjeld
Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences
Caisa Hedlinger
Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences
Abstract
This paper presents the transport game; a pedagogical tool developed to provide a competition-driven introduction to important issues in transport planning. The competitive element of the game concerns minimizing transportaton. The game is played between three two-player teams. Each team has wood supply responsibility for a pulp mill and a saw mill. Given a varying weekly demand for each mill, the teams procure round wood from the 64 supply nodes in the region. The planning decisions in the game are aimed at minimizing the total transport distance (loaded + unloaded) for the weekly demand. Planning decisions have the following priority: 1) filling the mill demand, 2) minimizing the loaded transport distance by purchasing wood close to the mill 3) minimizing the unloaded transport distance by identifying backhauls flows.
The game forces the players to manually handle a high number of decision alternatives without any form of decision support. It is used to give the students a practical understanding of basic issues to accompany their theoretical lessons. It can also be used as an experimental laboratory to examine the effect of different restrictions on proficiency. The paper presents results from student exercises where development of player proficiency is examined.
