An effective tabu search approach with improved loading algorithms for the 3L-CVRP

In this paper, we consider the Three-Dimensional Loading Capacitated Vehicle Routing Problem(3L-CVRP) which combines the routing of a fleet of vehicles and the loading of three-dimensional shaped goods into the vehicles while minimizing the total travel distance incurred. Apparently, 3L-CVRP is a combination of capacitated vehicle routing and three-dimensional bin packing problem and thus of high complexity. Different from most of previous works, we propose an innovative approach, called improved least waste heuristic for solving the loading subproblem, which is iteratively invoked by a simple tabu search algorithm for the routing. The good performance in terms of the solution quality and computational efficiency of our approach is shown through the numerical experiments on the benchmark instances from literature.

[1]  Manuel Iori,et al.  Metaheuristic algorithms for combinatorial optimization problems , 2005, 4OR.

[2]  Teodor Gabriel Crainic,et al.  Extreme Point-Based Heuristics for Three-Dimensional Bin Packing , 2008, INFORMS J. Comput..

[3]  Daniele Vigo,et al.  Algorithm 864: General and robot-packable variants of the three-dimensional bin packing problem , 2007, TOMS.

[4]  Richard F. Hartl,et al.  Metaheuristics for the vehicle routing problem with loading constraints , 2007 .

[5]  Lixin Miao,et al.  A hybrid approach for the vehicle routing problem with three-dimensional loading constraints , 2013, Comput. Oper. Res..

[6]  Andrew Lim,et al.  A two-stage tabu search algorithm with enhanced packing heuristics for the 3L-CVRP and M3L-CVRP , 2012, Comput. Oper. Res..

[7]  Ronald L. Rivest,et al.  Orthogonal Packings in Two Dimensions , 1980, SIAM J. Comput..

[8]  G. Clarke,et al.  Scheduling of Vehicles from a Central Depot to a Number of Delivery Points , 1964 .

[9]  Emmanouil E. Zachariadis,et al.  A Hybrid Metaheuristic Algorithm for the Integrated Vehicle Routing and Three-Dimensional Container-Loading Problem , 2009, IEEE Transactions on Intelligent Transportation Systems.

[10]  Daniele Vigo,et al.  Heuristic algorithms for the three-dimensional bin packing problem , 2002, Eur. J. Oper. Res..

[11]  Sándor P. Fekete,et al.  New classes of fast lower bounds for bin packing problems , 2001, Math. Program..

[12]  Günther Josef Füllerer.  Vehicle routing with multi-dimensional loading constraints , 2008 .

[13]  Daniele Vigo,et al.  Erratum to "The Three-Dimensional Bin Packing Problem": Robot-Packable and Orthogonal Variants of Packing Problems , 2005, Oper. Res..

[14]  Daniele Vigo,et al.  An Exact Approach for the Vehicle Routing Problem with Two-Dimensional Loading Constraints , 2007, Transp. Sci..

[15]  Guenther Fuellerer,et al.  Ant colony optimization for the two-dimensional loading vehicle routing problem , 2009, Comput. Oper. Res..

[16]  Manuel Iori,et al.  Heuristic and exact algorithms for the multi-pile vehicle routing problem , 2011, OR Spectr..

[17]  Daniele Vigo,et al.  The Three-Dimensional Bin Packing Problem , 2000, Oper. Res..

[18]  Michel Gendreau,et al.  Solving the hub location problem in a star–star network , 2008 .

[19]  Ana Moura.  A Multi-Objective Genetic Algorithm for the Vehicle Routing with Time Windows and Loading Problem , 2008 .

[20]  Daniele Vigo,et al.  Heuristic and Metaheuristic Approaches for a Class of Two-Dimensional Bin Packing Problems , 1999, INFORMS J. Comput..

[21]  Martin W. P. Savelsbergh,et al.  An Optimization-Based Heuristic for the Split Delivery Vehicle Routing Problem , 2008, Transp. Sci..

[22]  Paolo Toth,et al.  The Vehicle Routing Problem , 2002, SIAM monographs on discrete mathematics and applications.

[23]  Paolo Toth,et al.  Models, relaxations and exact approaches for the capacitated vehicle routing problem , 2002, Discret. Appl. Math..

[24]  Emmanouil E. Zachariadis,et al.  A Guided Tabu Search for the Vehicle Routing Problem with two-dimensional loading constraints , 2009, Eur. J. Oper. Res..

[25]  Michel Gendreau,et al.  New Heuristics for the Vehicle Routing Problem , 2005 .

[26]  Lijun Wei,et al.  A least wasted first heuristic algorithm for the rectangular packing problem , 2009, Comput. Oper. Res..

[27]  David Pisinger,et al.  Heuristics for the container loading problem , 2002, Eur. J. Oper. Res..

[28]  Ana Moura,et al.  An integrated approach to the vehicle routing and container loading problems , 2009, OR Spectr..

[29]  Andreas Bortfeldt,et al.  A hybrid algorithm for the capacitated vehicle routing problem with three-dimensional loading constraints , 2012, Comput. Oper. Res..

[30]  Nicos Christofides,et al.  An Algorithm for Two-Dimensional Cutting Problems , 1977, Oper. Res..

[31]  Bruce L. Golden,et al.  The vehicle routing problem : latest advances and new challenges , 2008 .

[32]  Fan Wang,et al.  A new packing heuristic based algorithm for Vehicle Routing Problem with Three-dimensional Loading constraints , 2010, 2010 IEEE International Conference on Automation Science and Engineering.

[33]  Mauricio G. C. Resende,et al.  A biased random key genetic algorithm for 2D and 3D bin packing problems , 2013 .

[34]  Krzysztof Fleszar,et al.  A variable neighbourhood search algorithm for the open vehicle routing problem , 2009, Eur. J. Oper. Res..

[35]  Marco A. Boschetti.  New lower bounds for the three-dimensional finite bin packing problem , 2004, Discret. Appl. Math..

[36]  Fan Wang,et al.  A Survey on Vehicle Routing Problem with Loading Constraints , 2009, 2009 International Joint Conference on Computational Sciences and Optimization.

[37]  Rob van Stee,et al.  New Bounds for Multidimensional Packing , 2003, Algorithmica.

[38]  Guenther Fuellerer,et al.  Metaheuristics for vehicle routing problems with three-dimensional loading constraints , 2010, Eur. J. Oper. Res..

[39]  Teodor Gabriel Crainic,et al.  TS2PACK: A two-level tabu search for the three-dimensional bin packing problem , 2009, Eur. J. Oper. Res..

[40]  Ramón Alvarez-Valdés,et al.  A hybrid GRASP/VND algorithm for two- and three-dimensional bin packing , 2010, Ann. Oper. Res..

[41]  Manuel Iori,et al.  Routing problems with loading constraints , 2010 .

[42]  David Pisinger,et al.  Guided Local Search for the Three-Dimensional Bin-Packing Problem , 2003, INFORMS J. Comput..

[43]  Gilbert Laporte,et al.  New Insertion and Postoptimization Procedures for the Traveling Salesman Problem , 1992, Oper. Res..

[44]  Ulrich Derigs,et al.  A simple and efficient tabu search heuristic for solving the open vehicle routing problem , 2009, J. Oper. Res. Soc..

[45]  Michel Gendreau,et al.  A Tabu Search Algorithm for a Routing and Container Loading Problem , 2006, Transp. Sci..

[46]  Eduardo C. Xavier,et al.  A Branch-and-Cut Approach for the Vehicle Routing P roblem with Two-dimensional Loading Constraints , 2009 .