Optimal Allocation and Routing of Sanitation Vehicles on Urban Roads Under Multiple Constraints

To avoid unreasonable vehicle allocation caused by excessive manual experience in the urban sanitation vehicle dispatching problem, this paper proposes an approach for optimal allocation and routing of sanitation vehicles on urban roads under multiple constraints. First, multiple constraints in sanitation vehicle routing are comprehensively considered, including operation time limit, service time limit on links, driving speed limit, and vehicle exiting of the road network. The travel trajectory of each vehicle is described from time and space dimensions by expanding the physical road network into a time-space network. The optimal allocation and routing of sanitation vehicles are then described as an Arc Routing Problem (ARP) with multiple constraints. A mathematical model for minimizing the total vehicle ownership cost and travel time cost is developed. A branch-and-price algorithm is designed to solve the model accurately. The proposed approach was evaluated using 19 realistic instance networks in Industrial Park, Suzhou, China. The feasibility and effectiveness of the proposed approach were validated from three aspects, including economic cost, operational efficiency, and environmental benefit. The experimental results show that the proposed approach can significantly save the cost of sanitation operation and management while improving the travel efficiency of sanitation vehicles. Meanwhile, it is also capable of reducing carbon emissions effectively, forming good economic and social benefits and therefore providing a potential solution for smart sanitation. © 2022 Science Press. All rights reserved.