• Home
• News
• Committees
• Social Program
• Scientific Program ▼
  • Plenary Talks
  • Brainstorming sessions
  • Tutorials
  • Technical sessions
  • Talks by Speaker
  • Talks by Topic
  • Booklet
  • Book of Abstracts
• Practical Information ▼
  • Accommodation
  • Venue
• Important Dates and Payment
• Talks information

How appealing is an optimum?

Speaker: Joaquim Gromicho Chairman: Prof. Bruce Golden Tuesday, June 4, 9:45 - 10:30

We notice that drivers often deviate from the sequence of stops stipulated in the routes optimized for them. This results in higher mileage than planned and often in other forms of disruption, such as missing time windows or needing to unload cargo which is not yet freely reachable in the cargo bay. The latter increases delays. The bottom line is that the savings that our solutions promise on paper do not materialize because execution deviates from the plan.  

One can say that optimal is not always appealing, which in the end leads to the optimum route not being executed. To the best of our knowledge, Diego Gabriel Rossit, Daniele Vigo, Fernando Tohmé and Mariano Frutos offer in their recent paper ‘Visual attractiveness in routing problems: A review’ a breakthrough in this area. Visual attractiveness is certainly appealing to planners. But is it also appealing to drivers? How can we improve the odds that our optimized routes are driven as planned?

You are so beautiful to me,

 why visual attractiveness in VRPs matters and what is it anyway?

Speaker: Werner Heid  Chairman: Prof. Wout Dullaert Tuesday, June 4, 9:45 - 10:30

Visually attractive routing plans are getting an increasing attention. Experience in practically relevant applications suggests that such solutions are preferred by managers, planners and drivers. The session will address various questions related to this observation.

-       If beauty is in the eye of the beholder, how can we measure visual attractiveness objectively?

-       If there is beauty in simplicity, what would simple plans and routes look like and besides, how can we obtain them?

-       As minimum or near minimum-cost routing plans can look remarkably unattractive, do we even solve the right problem?

-       Is beauty just an unnecessary necessity or are there practical benefits of visually attractive routes?

-       Do autonomously driving vehicles still long for beautiful routes?

The questions shall help to stimulate a lively exchange and develop a deeper and more comprehensive understanding of this exciting concept.