On the transportation cost norm on finite metric graphs

TL;DR

This paper investigates the transportation cost norm on finite metric graphs, providing simplified proofs for the existence and support properties of optimal transportation plans, especially on trees and cycles, with implications for related formulas.

Contribution

It offers new, concise proofs for the existence and support characteristics of optimal transportation plans on finite metric graphs, including trees and cycles.

Findings

Optimal plans supported on V+×V-

Existence of plans supported on graph edges

Existence of plans supported on spanning trees

Abstract

For a finite metric graph $X=(V,E,\ell)$, where $V$ is endowed with the shortest path metric, we consider the transportation cost problem associated with the distance $d$ on $V$. Namely, for $f$ a function with total sum 0 on $V$, write $f=\sum_{a,b\in V}P(a,b)(\delta_a-\delta_b)$ where the transportation plan $P$ satisfies $P(a,b)\geq 0$ for $(a,b)\in V\times V$. The cost of $P$ is $W(P):=\sum_{a,b\in V}P(a,b)d(a,b)$ and the transportation norm of $f$ is $\|f\|_{TC}=\min_P W(P)$ where $P$ runs over all transportation plans for $f$. In this semi-survey paper, we give short proofs for the following statements: 1)There always exists an optimal transportation plan supported in $V_+\times V_-$ where $V_+=\{x\in V: f(x)>0\}$ and $V_-=\{x\in V: f(x)<0\}$. If $X$ is a metric tree, we may moreover assume that this plan involves at most $|Supp(f)|-1$ transports. 2) There always exists an optimal transportation plan supported in the set of edges of $X$. 3) Better, there always exists an optimal transportation plan supported in some spanning tree of $X$. We use this to reprove known formulae for the transportation norm when $X$ is either a tree or a cycle.