Mixed integer programming with decomposition for workforce scheduling and routing with time-dependent activities constraints

Laesanklang, Wasakorn; Landa-Silva, Dario; Castillo-Salazar, J. Arturo

Abstract

We present a mixed integer programming decomposition approach to tackle workforce scheduling and routing problems (WSRP) that involve time-dependent activities constraints. The proposed method is called repeated decomposition with conflict repair (RDCR) and it consists of repeatedly applying a phase of problem decomposition and sub-problem solving, followed by a phase dedicated to conflict repair. Five types of time dependent activities constraints are considered: overlapping, synchronisation, minimum difference, maximum difference, and minimum-maximum difference. Experiments are conducted to compare the proposed method to a tailored greedy heuristic. Results show that the proposed RDCR is an effective approach to harness the power of mixed integer programming solvers to tackle the difficult and highly constrained WSRP in practical computational time.

Citation

Laesanklang, W., Landa-Silva, D., & Castillo-Salazar, J. A. (2016). Mixed integer programming with decomposition for workforce scheduling and routing with time-dependent activities constraints.

• Conference Name: Proceedings of the 5th International Conference on Operations Research and Enterprise Systems (ICORES 2016)
• End Date: Feb 27, 2016
• Publication Date: Feb 1, 2016
• Deposit Date: Mar 7, 2016
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Keywords: Workforce scheduling and routing problem, Time-dependent activities constraints, Mixed integer programming,; Problem decomposition
• Public URL: https://nottingham-repository.worktribe.com/output/978472
• Related Public URLs: http://www.icores.org/
• Additional Information: Published in: Proceedings of the 5th International Conference in Operations Research and Enterprise Systems. ISBN 9789897581717, pp. 330-339