2016/03/14 by Jonathan D. Adler, Pitu B. Mirchandani · 2 citations
Engineering · #Electric Vehicles and Infrastructure #Transportation and Mobility Innovations #Vehicle Routing Optimization Methods
paper · doi:10.1287/trsc.2015.0615
openalex publication_date 2016/03/14 · crossref created 2016/03/14 · crossref issued 2017/05/01 · crossref published 2017/05/01 · crossref published-print 2017/05/01 · crossref deposited 2023/04/02 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/31 · crossref indexed 2026/07/31
Alternative-fuel vehicles are gaining popularity as a mode of transit, and research is being done into how current infrastructure can accommodate them. The problem of vehicle scheduling consists of assigning a fleet of vehicles to service a given set of trips with start and end times. Vehicle scheduling changes when alternative-fuel vehicles are used since the vehicles can carry only a limited amount of fuel and can refuel only at fixed locations. This paper presents the alternative-fuel multiple depot vehicle scheduling problem, a modification of the standard multiple depot vehicle scheduling problem where there is a given set of fueling stations and a fuel capacity for the vehicles. The problem is formally defined and formulated as an integer program, and a branch-and-price algorithm is proposed to solve the problem. A heuristic solution is also presented, and both are tested on randomly generated data and data on the Valley Metro bus network in the Phoenix, Arizona, metropolitan area.