You are an analyst at an industrial property developer and landlord, which has recently purchased a plot of land to be developed into a new multi-storey warehouse in land-scarce Singapore. The developer intends to partner with a logistics "co-sharing" start-up and offer the storage space on a short-term pay-per-use basis to small businesses. Hence, the developer would like to install as many pallet positions as possible in the warehouse. An architect has come up with some high-level specifications for the warehouse, based on site and plot-ratio restrictions. The three-storey facility would be rectangular in shape, with floor area of 40m by 50m and a ceiling clearance height of 6m for each floor. About 10% of the space would be accounted for by support facilities such as toilets, lifts, ventilation equipment etc. Based on feedback from prospective customers, the developer intends to install single-deep selective pallet racks. Each rack measures 4m in length, 1m in depth and 5.3m in height when assembled. All safety clearances must be at least 100mm. You have been asked to provide some advice before the building plans are finalised. You estimate that based on a pallet footprint of 1.2 square metres (sqm), up to 2,000 pallet positions can be incorporated into the facility. However, the actual number of pallet positions is likely to be far lower due to site constraints and other factors. Besides, the racks must be accessible by forklifts that have a turning radius of at least 1m.

(a) Recommend the optimal column spacing and minimum pick-aisle width. Support your answer with calculations. You may make and state any reasonable assumptions that are required. (10 marks)

(b) Appraise three (3) other factors (other than column spacing and forklift type) that could prevent the design of a layout that maximises the number of pallets that can be stored in the facility. (9 marks)

(c) Suggest two (2) ways that a developer can increase the storage capacity of the facility without increasing the size of the warehouse.