Revisit the Ocean World Theme Park, and use the daily flow of visitors between attractions found in Example 7.3 for a different analysis.
a. Recommend a layout that would maximize the total travel distance between attractions.
b. What benefit would such a layout have for the owners of Ocean World Theme Park?
c. What reservations do you have about using the data from Table 7.3for this new approach to the Ocean World Theme Park layout?
Example 7.3
Ocean World Theme Park
The architect for Ocean World is beginning to formulate plans for the development of property outside New Orleans, Louisana, for a second marine theme park after the success of its Neptune’s Realm on the West Coast. Because of the hot and humid gulf weather during the
summer months, ways to minimize the visitors’ total travel distance between attractions are being considered. Data showing a typical day’s flow of visitors between attractions at San Diego are given in Table 7.3and will be used in the layout planning.
A heuristic called operations sequence analysis will be used to identify a good layout for this relative location problem. 5 This method uses as input the matrix of flows between departments and a grid showing the geographic center location for department assignments. In Table 7.3 , we have created a triangularized form of the original flow matrix to sum the flows in either direction because we are interested only in the total.
The heuristic begins with an initial layout, shown on the grid in Figure 7.8 a. This initial layout is arbitrary but could be based on judgment or past experience. Table 7.3suggests that attractions with high daily flow between them should be placed adjacent to each other. For example, we cannot see a need to place A adjacent to D, but it would be appropriate to place A close to C.