Reorganisation of the site is the key to success for the reduction of the operational costs.

To a layman, a site for storage of parts and construction materials seems a disordered ball of various goods and processes. Also this site in Gent accommodates several buildings for storage, workshops for repair activities, offices and terrains for exterior storage. In addition to the large variety of goods and the variability of the inbound and outbound flow, the problem of sometimes difficult to manipulate construction materials is faced.

Van Looy Group has realised several logistics reorganisations in similar projects and proceeds according to a pragmatic stepped plan. The execution of the reorganisation leads to a reduction of the operational costs to the amount of 20%. Its principles rely on following pillars:

Reorganisation of the truck traffic.
Through the reorganisation of the routing of the trucks, three goals were obtained: increased safety, better control at the reception and shipping and reduction of the waiting queues. A side effect of the minimised truck manoeuvring is also a reduction of the soot exhaust of the gasoil trucks..

Improved handling techniques
The size of the goods varies from very small parts to large construction components weighing several tons. The installation of new material handling and storage techniques results in a reduction of the occupied floor space up to 30%. As a consequence, the newly available space could be reused to install efficient and ergonomic workshops. For larger components, the product flow passes through multiple different handing units (side loaders, overhead cranes, swivel cranes, tower cranes). In this area, the profit in handling time is found through the optimal gearing of the several handling techniques.

Improved slotting of the stock
In addition to the introduction of new material handling techniques, the improved slotting of the stock has lead to a considerable reduction of the driving distances, becoming up to 16 % less. This is the result of several factors: the analysis of the stock rotation of the goods, a focused steering of the inbound and the review of the functioning of the workshops.

Repositioning of the offices.
Control and management of the activities on site have a considerable impact on the efficiency of the operations. The planning of the several construction yards must be aligned with the scheduling of the necessary maintenance tasks and the personnel availability. The maintenance tasks include e.g. cleaning, revision, repair and calibration.
A clean view from the offices onto the shop floor and the outside storage areas has a strong contribution to the agile management of the activities.

< back