To split or not to split That is the question

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1、TransportationResearchPartE44(2008)114–123www.elsevier.com/locate/treTosplitornottosplit:Thatisthequestionab,*aClaudiaArchetti,MartinW.P.Savelsbergh,M.GraziaSperanzaaDepartmentofQuantitativeMethods,UniversityofBrescia,ContradaS.Chiara50,25122Brescia,ItalybSchoolofIndustrialandS

2、ystemsEngineering,GeorgiaInstituteofTechnology,Atlanta,GA30332-0205,USAReceived16January2006;receivedinrevisedform22April2006;accepted27April2006AbstractIndistributionproblems,afleetofvehiclesservesthedemandofasetofcustomers.Eachcustomeristypicallyservedbyasinglevehicle.However,

3、morecosteffectivedistributionplansmayexistifsomecustomersareservedbymorethanonevehicle,i.e.,ifsomedeliveriesaresplit.Wecharacterizedistributionenvironmentsinwhichallowingsplitdeliveriesislikelytobebeneficial.Weshow,throughanempiricalstudy,thatthelargestbenefitsareobtainedwhenmeanc

4、ustomerdemandisalittleoverhalfthevehiclecapacityandcustomerdemandvarianceisrelativelysmall.Ó2006ElsevierLtd.Allrightsreserved.Keywords:Vehiclerouting;Splitdeliveries1.IntroductionIntheclassicalvehicleroutingproblem(VRP)afleetofcapacitatedvehiclesisavailabletoserveasetofcus-tomer

5、swithknowndemand.Eachcustomerisrequiredtobevisitedbyexactlyonevehicleandtheobjectiveistominimizethetotaldistancetraveled.Inthesplitdeliveryvehicleroutingproblem(SDVRP),introducedbyDrorandTrudeau(1989),therestrictionthateachcustomerhastobevisitedexactlyonceisremoved,i.e.,splitde

6、liveriesareallowed.Recently,therehasbeenaresurgenceininterestfortheSDVRP.Andrightfullyso.Itisachallengingvariantofthevehicleroutingproblemwithsignificantpotentialforpracticalimplications.Thelat-ter,i.e.,thepracticalimplicationsofsplitdeliveries,isthefocusofthispaper.Thereduction

7、indeliverycosts,i.e.,theupside,isacriticalfactorforcompaniesconsideringtomovetoadistributionsysteminwhichsplitdeliveriesareallowed.However,thereisadownsideaswell,e.g.,highercustomerinconvenienceandmorecom-plexadministrationandaccounting.Companiesneedtocarefullyevaluatethesetrad

8、e-offs.Recently,Archettietal.(2006)haveshownthattheredu