The capacitated vehicle routing problem with loading constraints

Abstract

Distributors of goods have to take loading constraints into account to make a realistic planning for their delivery vehicles, while current planning tools generally do not include these constraints. The most common loading problems encountered in the distribution of goods are multi-dimensional packing constraints, unloading sequence constraints, stability constraints and axle weight constraints. This paper combines vehicle routing problems with loading problems. First, an overview of the relevant literature is provided. Second, the paper will shed light on axle weight limits since, to our knowledge, VRPs with axle weight constraints have not yet been considered in literature. A two dimensional VRP with sequence based loading is formulated. This model is used to perform computational experiments on a small network. For each computed vehicle route, the weight on the axles is calculated and compared with legal limits.