Login | Register

A decision support system for goods distribution planning in urban areas

Title:

A decision support system for goods distribution planning in urban areas

Khabbazian, Ali (2012) A decision support system for goods distribution planning in urban areas. Masters thesis, Concordia University.

[thumbnail of Khabbazian_MSc_S2012.pdf]
Preview
Text (application/pdf)
Khabbazian_MSc_S2012.pdf - Accepted Version
5MB

Abstract

Efficient goods distribution planning is vital to ensure high business revenues for logistics operators and minimize negative impacts on the environment. In this thesis, we address three main problems related to goods distribution planning in urban areas namely customer allocation, order scheduling, and vehicle routing. A three step approach is proposed. In the first step, we use Nearest Neighbour and Tabu Search for balanced allocation of customers to logistics depots. In the second step, Genetic Algorithm approach is used to perform order scheduling at each depot for the allocated customers. In the third and the last step, we perform vehicle allocations and generate fastest paths for goods delivery to customers using modified Dijkstra’s algorithm. All these decisions are made considering realistic conditions associated with goods distribution in urban areas such as presence of congestion, municipal regulations, for example vehicle sizing, timing and access regulations etc. The objective is to minimize total distribution costs of logistics operators under these constraints.
A prototype decision support system is developed integrating the proposed approaches for goods distribution planning in urban areas. The strength of the proposed decision support system is its ability to generate fast and efficient solutions for balanced customer allocation, dynamic order scheduling, vehicle allocation considering environmental constraints and fastest path generation under dynamic traffic conditions. The proposed model results are verified and validated against other standard approaches available in literature.

Divisions:Concordia University > Gina Cody School of Engineering and Computer Science > Concordia Institute for Information Systems Engineering
Item Type:Thesis (Masters)
Authors:Khabbazian, Ali
Institution:Concordia University
Degree Name:M.A. Sc.
Program:Quality Systems Engineering
Date:26 April 2012
Thesis Supervisor(s):Awasthi, Anjali
ID Code:973971
Deposited By: ALI KHABBAZIAN
Deposited On:19 Jun 2012 17:54
Last Modified:18 Jan 2018 17:37
All items in Spectrum are protected by copyright, with all rights reserved. The use of items is governed by Spectrum's terms of access.

Repository Staff Only: item control page

Downloads per month over past year

Research related to the current document (at the CORE website)
- Research related to the current document (at the CORE website)
Back to top Back to top