A framework for small but rich vehicle routing problems

TL;DR

This paper introduces a flexible framework for small but complex vehicle routing problems, leveraging dynamic programming to handle various constraints efficiently, and demonstrates strong performance on benchmark data.

Contribution

It proposes a novel dynamic programming-based framework adaptable to diverse VRP variants, enhancing solution quality for small but rich routing problems.

Findings

Excellent performance on published test data

Framework easily extends to various VRP constraints

Effective for small, complex routing scenarios

Abstract

In this paper we consider a 2-vehicle routing problem which can be viewed as a building block for the varieties of the vehicle routing problems (VRPs). To approach this problem, we suggest a framework based on the Held and Karp dynamic programming algorithm for the classical travelling salesman problem. An algorithm based on this framework shows an exceptionally good performance on published test data. Our approach can be easily extended to a variety of constraints/attributes in the VRP, hence the wording "small but rich" in the title of our paper.