Transportation Problem: Transportation Problems. Basically, The Purpose Is To Minimize The Cost of Shipping Goods From
Transportation Problem: Transportation Problems. Basically, The Purpose Is To Minimize The Cost of Shipping Goods From
Transportation Problem: Transportation Problems. Basically, The Purpose Is To Minimize The Cost of Shipping Goods From
Operations research (OR) are concerned with scientifically deciding how to best design and
operate peoplemachine systems, usually under conditions requiring the allocation of scarce
resources . (1Operations Research Society of America).
Operations research tools and has been a decision-making aid in almost all manufacturing
industries and in financial and service organizations. Key problem managers face is how to
allocate scarce resources among various activities or projects. Linear programming, or LP, is a
method of allocating resources in an optimal way. It is one of the most widely used In the term
linear programming, programming refers to mathematical programming.
One of the most important and successful applications of quantitative analysis to solving
business problems has been in the physical distribution of products, commonly referred to as
transportation problems. Basically, the purpose is to minimize the cost of shipping goods from
one location to another so that the needs of each arrival area are met and every shipping location
operates within its capacity. However, quantitative analysis has been used for many problems
other than the physical distribution of goods.
We could set up a transportation problem and solve it using the simplex method as with any LP
problem (see using the Simplex Method to Solve Linear Programming Maximization
However, the special structure of the transportation problem allows us to solve it with a faster,
more economical algorithm than simplex. Problems of this type, containing thousands of
variables and constraints, can be solved in only a few seconds on a computer. In fact, we can
solve a relatively large transportation problem by hand.
There are some requirements for placing an LP problem into the transportation problem
category.
The transportation problem
Linear programming is good at solving problems with zillions of options, and finding the optimal
solution. Could it work for transportation problems? Costs are linear, and shipment quantities are
linear, so maybe so.
Since any transportation problem can be formulated as an LP, we can use the simplex method
to find an optimal solution. Because of the special structure of a transportation LP, the iterations
of the simple method have a very special form. The transportation simplex method is nothing but
the original simplex method, but it streamlines the iterations given this special form.
Introduction
Consider a commodity which is produced at various centers called SOURCES and is demanded
at various other DESTINATIONS. The production capacity of each source (availability) and the
requirement of each destination are known and fixed.
The cost of transporting one unit of the commodity from each source to each destination is also
known. The commodity is to be transported from various sources to different destinations in such
a way that the requirement of each destination is satisfied and at the same time the total cost of
transportation in minimized.
This optimum allocation of the commodity from various sources to different destinations is
called TRANSPORTATION PROBLEM.
Transportation models deals with the transportation of a product manufactured at
different plants or factories (supply origins) to a number of different warehouses (demand
destinations).
The objective to satisfy the destination requirements within the plants capacity
constraints at the minimum transportation cost.
A typical transportation problem contains
Inputs:
Sources with availability
Destinations with requirements
Unit cost of transportation from various sources to destinations
Objective:
To determine schedule of transportation to minimize total transportation cost.
Simple Network Representation
A transportation problem can be stated mathematically as follows:
Let there be m SOURCES and n DESTINATIONS
Let a
i
: the availability at the i
th
source
b
j
: the requirement of the j
th
destination.
C
ij
: the cost of transporting one unit of
commodity from the i
th
source to
the j
th
destination
x
ij
: the quantity of the commodity
transported from i
th
source to the j
th
destination (i=1, 2, m; j=1,2, ..n)
Source D
1
D
2
D
3
D
4
Availability
S
1
C
11
C
12
C
13
C
14
a
1
S
2
C
21
C
22
C
23
C
24
a
2
S
3
C
31
C
32
C
33
C
34
a
3
Requirement b
1
b
2
b
3
b
4
a
i =
b
j
The problem is to determine the values of x
ij
such that total cost of transportation is
minimized.
We assume that the total quantity available is the same as the total requirement.
i.e. a
i
= b
j
Balanced transportation problems
Unbalanced transportation problems
Include a dummy source or a dummy destination having a supply d or demand d to
convert it to a balanced transportation problem.
Where d=
A solution where the row total of allocations is equal to the availabilities and the column total is
equal to the requirements is called a feasible solution .The solution with m+n-1 allocations is
called a Basic Solution.
m
i
n
j
j i
b a
1 1
m
i
n
j
j i
b a
1 1
.
1 1 1 1
ly respective b a or a b
m
i
n
j
j i
n
j
m
i
i j
Prototype Problem
Holiday shipments of iPods to distribution centers
Production at 3 facilities,
A, supply 200k
B, supply 350k
C, supply 150k
Distribute to 4 centers,
N, demand 60k
S, demand 140k
E, demand 300k
W, demand 200k
Total demand vs. total supply