Abstract
This paper addresses an important combination of three-dimensional
loading and vehicle routing, known as the Three-Dimensional Loading
Capacitated Vehicle Routing Problem. The problem calls for the combined
optimization of the loading of freight into vehicles and the routing
of vehicles along a road network, with the aim of serving customers
with minimum traveling cost. Despite its clear practical relevance
in freight distribution, the literature on this problem is very limited.
This is because of its high combinatorial complexity. We solve the
problem by means of an Ant Colony Optimization algorithm, which makes
use of fast packing heuristics for the loading. The algorithm combines
two different heuristic information measures, one for routing and
one for packing. In numerical tests all publicly available test instances
are solved, and for almost all instances new best solutions are found.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 751-759 |
| Number of pages | 9 |
| Journal | European Journal of Operational Research |
| Volume | 201 |
| Issue number | 3 |
| DOIs | |
| Publication status | Published - 2010 |
Fields of science
- 502 Economics
- 211 Other Technical Sciences
- 502052 Business administration
- 502012 Industrial management
- 502017 Logistics
JKU Focus areas
- Social and Economic Sciences (in general)
