A goal programming approach for the facility layout problem with ergonomic constraint

In facility layout problems, ergonomic issues are generally not considered in the first place; instead, traditional layout aspects are taken into account. However, with the developing technology, legal responsibilities, and awareness of both the public and private sector to ergonomic issues, ergonomic concerns in designing any production area are getting more attention. The aim of this paper is to find an optimal single row facility layout arrangement taking into account both ergonomic and traditional layout aspects. The considered ergonomic feature is the noise exposure. If one worker exposures continuous high level of noise, temporary or permanent hearing loss may occur, which is not desired in the working life. To show the effect of noise exposure on layout, a mathematical model with noise constraint was developed. Moreover, a goal programming model which takes noise exposure, closeness ratings and material flow aspects as objectives was proposed. Traditional Analytical Hierarchy Process was utilized to gain the weights of the objectives. The applicability of the model was demonstrated by the solution of a hypothetical problem. The proposed models were tested and validated on different conditions to find out the effect of noise exposure. Cite this article as: Adem A, Durmaz ED, Şahin R, Dağdeviren M. A goal programming approach for the facility layout problem with ergonomic constraint. Sigma J Eng Nat Sci 2023;41(5):947−957.