A stochastic formulation of the two-echelon vehicle routing and loading bay reservation problem

Abstract

This paper studies a goods delivery problem for multiple courier companies in central city areas integrated with a loading bay scheduling problem. The goods delivery problem is formulated as a stochastic two-echelon vehicle routing problem, while the loading bays are managed through a central reservation system, which assigns loading bays to courier vehicles taking into account their delivery demands. A stochastic programming model with chance constraints is formulated to find the optimal vehicle routing and loading bay reservation strategy, and a hybrid genetic algorithm is developed to solve the model. Numerical results suggest that the reservation system can help coordinate deliveries from different courier companies and substantially improve the overall delivery efficiency and loading space utilisation.