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Combined location-routing problems—a neural network approach

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Abstract

While in location planning it is often assumed that deliveries are made on a direct-trip basis, in fact deliveries, e.g., to the different supermarkets belonging to a specific chain or to retail outlets of any kind, usually are performed as round-trips. Therefore, it is often necessary to combine the two issues of locating a depot and of planning tours in one problem formulation.

In this paper, a neural network approach based on a self-organizing map is proposed for solving such single-depot location-routing problems in the plane. The results derived by this approach are compared with those which can be found by different well-known heuristics, and it is shown that the self-organising map approach competes well with these concepts. Moreover, some modifications which rely on ideas from Tabu Search can be shown to be especially useful for increasing the number of feasible solutions found by the self-organising map approach. Finally, the implementation of the Weiszfeld procedure for a final improvement of the optimal depot location proves to be a useful device.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Lübecker Hafengesellschaft mbH, An der Untertrave 14-16, 23552, Lübeck, Germany

    Martin Schwardt

  2. Institut für Transportwirtschaft und Logistik, Wirtschaftsuniversität Wien, Nordbergstraße 15, 1090, Vienna, Austria

    Kathrin Fischer

Authors
  1. Martin Schwardt
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  2. Kathrin Fischer
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Correspondence to Kathrin Fischer.

Additional information

Part of this work was carried out at the Institut für Logistik und Transport, Universität Hamburg, Von-Melle-Park 5, 20146 Hamburg, Germany.

Part of this work was carried out during a lectureship at the Operations & Information Management Group, Aston Business School, Aston University, Aston Triangle, Birmingham B4 7ET, United Kingdom.

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Schwardt, M., Fischer, K. Combined location-routing problems—a neural network approach. Ann Oper Res 167, 253–269 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10479-008-0377-3

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