Algorithms for the Vehicle Routing and Scheduling Problems with Time Window Constraints

Marius M. Solomon
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Marius M. Solomon: Northeastern University, Boston, Massachusetts

Operations Research, 1987, vol. 35, issue 2, 254-265

Abstract: This paper considers the design and analysis of algorithms for vehicle routing and scheduling problems with time window constraints. Given the intrinsic difficulty of this problem class, approximation methods seem to offer the most promise for practical size problems. After describing a variety of heuristics, we conduct an extensive computational study of their performance. The problem set includes routing and scheduling environments that differ in terms of the type of data used to generate the problems, the percentage of customers with time windows, their tightness and positioning, and the scheduling horizon. We found that several heuristics performed well in different problem environments; in particular an insertion-type heuristic consistently gave very good results.

Keywords: 632 heuristic programming; 831 transportation; 483 distance algorithms (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 1987
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