Evaluation of consolidation center cargo capacity and loctions for China railway express

Abstract To solve problems of China railway express such as low load factor and profit margin, high pressure upon the government to subsidize the trains, this paper selects 27 cities as pre-candidate consolidation centers considering government policy and CRexpress operation experience, then evaluates the significance each node in Chinese railway, highway and national road networks using complex network theory. With the TOPSIS model and cargo rates to comprehensively evaluate the networks, 10 cities are identified. Of them, Taiyuan, Xi’an, Zhengzhou, Wuhan, Suzhou are selected as the optimal consolidation centers by a mixed integer programming.

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