Multimodal Capacitated Hub Location Problems with Multi-Commodities: An Application in Freight Transport

Abstract

Hub location problems (HLPs) support decision making on multimodal transport strategic planning. It is related to the location of hubs and the allocation of origin/destination (O/D) flow in a system. Classical formulations assume that these flows are predefined paths and direct delivery is not available. This applied research presents a mixed integer linear programming (MILP) model for a capacitated multimodal, multi-commodity HLP. Furthermore, an application on the export process in a Latin American country is detailed. The new proposed model, unlike the traditional HLP, allows direct shipment, and its O/D flows are part of the decision model. Situations with up to 100 nodes, six products, and two transport modes are used, working with initial and projected flows. All instances can be solved optimally using the commercial solver, Gurobi 7.5.0, in computational times less than a minute. Results indicate that only one hub is profitable for the case study, both for the initial and projected scenarios. The installation of a hub generates transport savings over 1% per year. Two factors affect the location decision: low concentration and distance between the hubs and destinations. Long distances involve an exhaustive use of trains instead of trucks, which leads to lower transport cost per unit.

Substantiation of Loading Hub Location for Electric Cargo Bikes Servicing City Areas with Restricted Traffic

“…To solve FLP, various approaches are used by scholars and practitioners. The most popular mathematical apparatus for substantiation of the loading hubs location is the mixed-integer linear programming [9,14,15,21,24], although the fuzzy-logic-based models are used as well [17,25]. Another direction for finding the solution of FLP is the simulationbased approaches [5,8,19,26]: The delivery and servicing processes are simulated for a set of alternative locations and the best option is being substantiated based on the simulation results.…”

“…Authors of the publication [20] use total system travel time and total system net energy consumption for optimal positioning of dynamic wireless charging infrastructure for battery electric vehicles, while the minimization of the power loss in a distribution network is considered as the objective function in the study [17] when solving the problem of the charging stations location. The paper [24] proposes solving the multimodal capacitated hub location problem based on the profitability of alternative locations. The authors of the study [7] use the total distance traveled and the CO2 emissions per parcel delivered to substantiate the efficiency of an urban micro-consolidation center located in the delivery area where the deliveries are performed by electrically-assisted cargo tricycles and electric vans.…”

On Multistage Multiscale Stochastic Capacitated Multiple Allocation Hub Network Expansion Planning

“…A real-life problem of a Turkish public institution is considered for validating the proposed approach for problem solving. A MILP model for a capacitated multimodal, multicommodity HLP is presented in [23], where a non-stop service mode (i.e., a direct transportation from origin to destination) is considered as the hub network alternative.…”

Optimizing Resources of Multimodal Transport Terminal for Material Flow Service

“…However, decision-making on the choice of service technologies and the amount of production resources requires preliminary justification using the advanced models of a transport hub functioning. Existing approaches to the modelling of technological processes of transport terminals are mainly based on analytical models [9][10][11][12][13][14] that do not allow researchers to estimate the complex influence of a set of random external factors on the efficiency of the hub's operation. Thus, the research direction of creating new models of operation of transport terminals using modern mathematical methods and information technologies is relevant, and the use of the resulting methodologies can increase the efficiency of the processes of logistics management and ensure the sustainable development of the transport system.…”