We propose a model that integrates inventory routing and freight consolidation for perishable goods with a fixed lifetime. The problem is motivated by the status quo of logistics in some U.S. agriculture markets, but adapts to other relevant two-echelon supply chains, e.g. combined production planning and distribution. We first identify special cases where solving single-echelon subproblems seq...

We study an integrated quantity discount and vehicle routing problem where truck utilization is increased by building multi-stop routes and increasing order sizes through a purchase incentive. We model the problem and prove it to be NP-hard. Our experiments show that commercial solvers do not effectively solve instances with more than ten buyers. We propose the use of non-compromising route eli...

This contribution addresses the consideration of time windows in the optimization of multi-commodity network flows. For each node, one interval is specified in which the visitation is allowed. Applications in freight flow consolidation let this problem become interesting. An optimization model is proposed and a construction heuristic is presented. For improving the generated solutions, a geneti...

Purpose In comparison to North America, railway companies in Europe are confronted with strong economic issues in running their wagonload traffic. The purpose of this paper is an analysis how infrastructural and institutional differences affect planning issues and economic efficiency. Method A particular decision problem from railway freight traffic, the Railroad Blocking Problem (RBP), is cons...

The 21st century will see a renewed focus on intermodal freight transportation driven by the changing requirements of global supply chains. Each of the transportation modes (air, inland water, ocean, pipeline, rail, and road) has gone through technological evolution and has functioned separately under a modally based regulatory structure for most of the 20th century. With the development of con...

The locomotive assignment and the freight train scheduling are important problems in railway transportation. Freight cars are coupled to form a freight rake. The freight rake becomes a train when a locomotive is coupled to it. The locomotive assignment problem assigns locomotives to a set of freight rakes in a way that, with minimum locomotive deadheading time, rake coupling delay and locomotiv...

Network freight flow consolidation organizes the commodity flow with special attention to the minimization of the flow costs but the efficiency of transport resources is not addressed. In contrast, vehicle routing targets primarily the maximization of the efficiency of transport resources but the commodity-related preferences are treated as inferior requirements. This article is about the probl...