An efficient two-staged approach for generating block layouts

Multidimensional scaling (MDS) is a useful mathematical tool that enables the analysis of data in areas where organized concepts and underlying dimensions are not well developed. In this paper, MDS algorithms are used as a dimension reduction tool which arranges facilities in a two-dimensional space while preserving the adjacency relationship between facilities. The output of MDS is a scatter diagram and is in turn used as the input or location references for developing into the final block layout. The bay structures of layout are considered where the given floor space is first partitioned horizontally or vertically into bays, which are subsequently partitioned into the blocks. Rotating the scatter diagram about the origin results in different layouts in the bay structure. A simulated annealing approach is adopted to rotate the scatter diagram so that the total cost of traveling between facilities and shape violation in the final layout is minimized. This paper discusses the application of multidimensional scaling (MDS) and simulated annealing (SA) to efficiently design facility layout. MDS is a powerful mathematical tool widely used in psychometry as well as in marketing research. By using MDS to generate a reference scatter diagram, a layout can subsequently be developed. The SA algorithm is then applied to rotate the scatter diagram from MDS so that a layout with the total cost of traveling between facilities being minimized can be obtained.