CanQueue 2025

CanQueue 2025

Welcome to the website of the 25th edition of the CanQueue workshop, which will be held on August 21-22, 2025 at Ivey Business School, Western University in London, Ontario.

What is CanQueue?

CanQueue is one of the major queueing conferences in North America. The first workshop was organized by Dr. A. S. Alfa at the University of Manitoba in 1999, and the name CanQueue has been associated with these meetings since the 2000 edition in London, Ontario. The goal of the conference is to promote research and applications of queueing theory.

This annual conference provides an important platform for people, including leading Canadian and international queueing theorists, applied probabilists, scientists, researchers, engineers, executives, and students, to meet and share their new research findings, and to encourage collaboration on ongoing research initiatives.

Organizing Committee

Invited Speakers

We are thrilled to welcome Prof. Saif Benjaafar (University of Michigan) as our keynote speaker and Prof. Jing Dong (Columbia Business School) as our featured speaker.

Speaker Bios:

Prof. Saif Benjaafar is the Seth Bonder Collegiate Professor of Industrial and Operations Engineering and Co-Director of the Joel D. Tauber Institute for Global Operations at the University of Michigan. His research spans operations management, supply chain design, and sustainable operations, with influential work on the sharing economy, on-demand services, and online marketplaces. He has pioneered models that integrate economic and environmental considerations into supply chain management and service platform design. A Fellow of INFORMS, MSOM, and IISE, he previously held leadership roles at the University of Minnesota and Singapore University of Technology and Design. He also served as Editor-in-Chief of Service Science.

Prof. Jing Dong is the DeRosa Family Associate Professor of Business in the Decision, Risk, and Operations Division at Columbia Business School. Her research lies at the intersection of applied probability and service operations, with a particular focus on data-driven stochastic modeling for healthcare systems. She has developed analytical and simulation-based methods to improve patient flow and support decision-making in complex service environments. Her work advances both the theory and practice of service operations management.

Invited Talks

Keynote Talk by Saif Benjaafar

Title: Queueing in the Sharing Economy

Abstract: The sharing economy, a term we use to refer to business models that are built around on-demand access to products and services, often mediated by online platforms that match many small suppliers or service providers to many small buyers, has emerged as an important area of study in operations. We discuss how queueing dynamics are at the core of many of these applications. We highlight distinguishing features of these dynamics, including two-sidedness, the spatial distribution of supply and demand, and network effects. We show how accounting for these features can lead to new models and to new research questions. We draw on a series of recent papers to describe our attempt at building such models and answering new questions.

Featured Talk by Jing Dong

Title: Measuring the Heterogeneous Effect of Emergency Department Boarding on Inpatient Length of Stay: Toward Efficient and Equitable Inpatient Bed Assignment

Abstract: Emergency Department (ED) boarding, the practice of holding admitted patients in the ED while awaiting an inpatient bed, is a major contributor to ED crowding and raises concerns about the quality of care. When inpatient bed capacity is limited, hospitals must decide how to prioritize boarding patients for inpatient bed assignment in a way that is both efficient and equitable. This talk connects new empirical evidence to queueing-theoretic design. We quantify the heterogeneous causal effect of boarding on inpatient length of stay, a key determinant of downstream capacity, and combine these individualized effects with queueing models and policy-learning methods to design inpatient bed assignment policies that reduce overall boarding time. A key feature of our approach is the explicit integration of fairness considerations into policy design: we evaluate policies under group- and individual-level fairness criteria and study the efficiency–fairness trade-off. In a high-fidelity, trace-driven discrete-event simulation calibrated to real hospital data, the proposed policies reduce average boarding time by over 75% relative to the current assignment rule while maintaining strong fairness performance. Beyond these results, the work surfaces interesting open problems for the queueing community, including scheduling with heterogeneous wait-dependent service times and efficiency–fairness trade-offs in queue scheduling. This is a joint work with Xiaole (Alyssa) Liu, Yosef Berlyand, and Martin Copenhaver.

Abstract Submission

Presentations of ongoing or completed research in queueing theory, applied probability and related areas are invited.

We define “queueing theory” broadly, to include any type of analysis of service systems in which congestion could occur, using any type of methodology.

Please click HERE to submit your abstract.

Registration

You have two options for registration:

  • Workshop only: CA$ 150 + applicable taxes.
  • Full registration with group dinner (on Thursday, Aug. 21): CA$ 235 + applicable taxes.

Please click HERE to register.

Important Dates

  • 10 August 2025 → 14 August 2025, 11:59 PM (Eastern Time) (Registration deadline)
  • 10 August 2025 → 14 August 2025, 11:59 PM (Eastern Time) (Abstract submission deadline)

Accommodation Information

  • Ivey Spencer Leadership Centre

    555 Windermere Road, London, Ontario N5X 2T1

  • Delta by Marriott London Armouries

    325 Dundas Street, London, Ontario N6B 1T9

  • Residence Inn by Marriott London

    383 Colborne Street, London Ontario N6B 3P5

  • The Park Hotel London

    242 Pall Mall Street, London Ontario N6A 5P6

About London, Ontario

London is a vibrant city located in Southwestern Ontario, Canada. Known for its beautiful parks, cultural attractions, and educational institutions, London offers visitors a pleasant environment with various amenities.

Here are some attractions you can enjoy during your visit to London:

  • Ivey Business School's state-of-the-art Richard Ivey Building
  • Western University's beautiful campus
  • The Covent Garden Market
  • Victoria Park in downtown London
  • London Museum and various art galleries