A hybrid algorithm for a vehicle routing problem with realistic constraints

Zhang, D, Cai, S, Ye, F, Si, YW and Nguyen, TT (2017) A hybrid algorithm for a vehicle routing problem with realistic constraints. Information Sciences, 394-95. pp. 167-182. ISSN 0020-0255

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Abstract

Proliferation of multi-national corporations and extremely competitive business environments have led to an unprecedented demand for third-party logistics services. However, recent studies on the vehicle routing problem (VRP) have considered only simple constraints. They also do not scale well to real-world problems that are encountered in the logistics industry. In this paper, we introduce a novel vehicle routing problem with time window and pallet loading constraints; this problem accounts for the actual needs of businesses in the logistics industry such as the delivery of consumer goods and agricultural products. To solve this new VRP, we propose a hybrid approach by combining Tabu search and the artificial bee colony algorithm. A new benchmark data set is generated to verify the performance of the proposed algorithm because the proposed VRP has never been reported in the literature. Experiments are performed for a data set of Solomon's 56 vehicle routing problem with time windows. Our approach is superior to a number of other heuristic algorithms in a comparison on Solomon's VRPTW instances. © 2017 Elsevier Inc.

Item Type:	Article
Uncontrolled Keywords:	01 Mathematical Sciences, 08 Information And Computing Sciences, 09 Engineering
Subjects:	H Social Sciences > HE Transportation and Communications Q Science > QA Mathematics
Divisions:	Maritime and Mechanical Engineering (merged with Engineering 10 Aug 20)
Publisher:	Elsevier
Date of acceptance:	14 February 2017
Date of first compliant Open Access:	15 February 2019
Date Deposited:	28 Mar 2017 10:01
Last Modified:	04 Sep 2021 11:46
DOI or ID number:	10.1016/j.ins.2017.02.028
URI:	https://researchonline.ljmu.ac.uk/id/eprint/6136

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