The Distribution and Pickup of Goods: A Literature Review and Survey

The Distribution and Pickup of Goods: A Literature Review and Survey

Hamdi Radhoui (University of Le Havre Normandy, France), Atour Taghipour (University of Le Havre Normandy, France) and Beatrice Canel-Depitre (University of Le Havre Normandy, France)
Copyright: © 2019 |Pages: 40
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-5225-7299-2.ch002

Abstract

The literature of vehicle scheduling problems is rich with different approaches, which try to schedule the distribution of products to a network of clients. In this case, the vehicle routing problem with deliveries and pickups of goods is an extension of vehicle routing problem in which goods are transported from a depot (or multiple depots) to customers, as well from customers to the depots. There is tremendous work in the literature of this problem. Freight transport management deals with all distribution problems along the supply chain. This chapter presents a comprehensive review and survey of this literature. The literature is classified into four fundamental classes according to the way of the customers' visit and methods used for solving. Then different variants are generated according to the elements of the proposed framework. During this chapter, based on a proposed framework, the authors analyze the literature of the vehicle routing problem with deliveries and pickups, and as a result, the researchers propose a new classification where they give a short modeling of it.
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Research Methodology

In order to analyze our literature, authors have adapted the research methodology proposed by Taghipour & Frayrer (2013) to analyze the literature based on a proposed framework of analysis and using this framework to classify the contributions. To do this, in this research, the researchers focus on the vehicle routing literature dedicated to the pickup and delivery of goods. First, they analyze selected contributions of the literature using a systematic analysis based on several dimensions. Next, using this analysis, they propose a classification scheme of vehicle routing with pickup and delivery approaches based on their underlying methodological tools. In other words, the authors propose a classification that emphasizes the methods, rather than the decision models’ characteristics or the VRP contexts. This allows them to analyze upfront the multidisciplinary nature of this domain of research (Taghipour & Frayret, 2013). This section outlines both the methodology used to identify and select contributions from the literature, and the systematic framework of analysis.

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