Frequency Model of Service Network Design for Freight Transportation

The service network design problem that concerns tactical planning of operations for transportation firms is of importance in transportation applications.In this paper,we focus on freight transportation service network design,which considers transportation demand,physical infrastructure,and transportation organization.The objective is to determine the cost minimizing or profit maximizing set of services,given limited transportation resources,while achieving optimal allocation and utilization of resources of the firm and satisfying customer's demands.We discuss the transportation policies that carriers apply to freight transportation organization,and develop the general frequency model of service network design for freight transportation.As the problem is NP-Hard,we propose a heuristic decomposition algorithm.Finally,the application of the frequency model and its solution approach are illustrated with an example.