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A Multimode Multiproduct Network Assignment Model for Strategic Planning of Freight Flows

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  • School of Management, Université du Québec à Montréal

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We present a normative model for simulating freight flows of multiple products on a multimodal network. The multimodal aspects of the transportation system considered are accounted for in the network representation chosen. The multiproduct aspects of the model are exploited in the solution procedure, which is a Gauss-Seidel-Linear Approximation Algorithm. An important component of the solution algorithm is the computation of shortest paths with intermodal transfer costs. Computational results obtained with this algorithm on a network that corresponds to the Brazil transportation network are presented. Several applications of this model are reported as well.
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... During early years, national freight transport models were typically established as network design models. Specific examples include STAN (Guelat et al., 1990;Crainic et al., 1990a), NODUS (Jourquin and Beuthe, 1996) and TLSS (Arnold et al., 2004). In this approach, the freight transport system is modeled ''bottom-up'' as a graph. ...
... Operational costs are computed by assigning transport demand between node pairs to specific modes and routes within the graph. Examples of these models have been used in different countries, including Brazil, Sweden and Norway (Guelat et al., 1990;De Jong and Johnson, 2009). ...
... Other directions for future work include improving model accuracy-for example, by adopting a multi-stage approach with more than two stages or incorporating new elements, such as vessel retrofitting. Additionally, enhancing computational performance by developing tailored solution methods, such as decomposition (e.g., by product groups (Guelat et al., 1990), mode-fuel combinations, or uncertainty scenarios) or heuristic techniques, is a promising avenue. ...
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