Scheduling Trucks in Multi-Door Cross Docking Systems: An Adaptive Genetic Algorithm with a Dispatching Rule

摘要

One of the most important operational management problems of a cross docking system is the truck scheduling problem. Cross docking is a logistics management concept in which products delivered to a distribution center by inbound trucks are immediately sorted out, routed and loaded into outbound trucks for delivery to customers. The truck scheduling problem in a multi-door cross docking system considered in this paper comprises the assignment of trucks to dock doors and the determination of docking sequences for all inbound and outbound trucks in order to minimize the total operation time. A mathematical model for optimal solution is derived, and the genetic algorithms (GAs) and the adaptive genetic algorithms (AGAs) as solution approaches with different types of chromosomes are proposed. The performance of the meta-heuristic algorithms are evaluated using randomly generated several examples.