The Evolution of the Vehicle Routing Problem: A Survey of Vrp Research and Practice from 2005 to 2022

This book presents state-of-the-art research and practice in optimization routing, specifically the vehicle routing problem (VRP). Since its introduction in the late 1950s, the VRP has been a very significant area of research and practice in operations research. Vehicles are used to make deliveries and for pick-ups every day and everywhere. Companies such as Amazon, UPS, FedEx, and DHL use route optimization to reduce mileage, fuel use, number of trucks on the road, and carbon dioxide emissions. The authors compile and analyze 135 survey and review articles on vehicle routing topics published between 2005 and 2022 in an effort to make key observations about publication and trend history, summarize the overall contributions in the field, and identify trends in VRP research and practice. The authors have compiled published research on models, algorithms, and applications for specific areas, including: alternative and multiple objectives
arc routing and general routing
drones, last-mile delivery, and urban distribution
dynamic and stochastic routing
green routing
inventory routing
loading constraints
location-routing
multiple depots
pickup and delivery and dial-a-ride problems
rich and multi-attribute routing
routing over time
shipping
two-echelon, collaborative, and inter-terminal problems
specific variants, benchmark datasets, and software
and exact algorithms and heuristics. In addition, the book discusses how vehicle routing problems are among the most widely studied problems in combinatorial optimization due to the mathematical complexity and practical significance.