Fraunhofer: Dynamic route planner in development for logistics

Planning vehicle routes remains more of an art than science. While the dispatcher may know what needs to be delivered where, before the vehicle leaves the depot, he or she does not know what orders to pick up goods will come in once the trucks are en route.

“All day long new orders come in, existing ones are cancelled or changed, but no more real planning takes place,” says Axel Simroth of the Fraunhofer Institute for Transportation and Infrastructure Systems. Dispatchers build a safety margin into route plans, but if they allow too great a margin, they waste capacity. If they allow too little, deliveries and pick-ups are late.

In a joint project with logistics experts from GTS Systems and Consulting GmbH, Simroth and colleagues are developing decision support systems that can replan routes as new orders come in. The software program creates vehicle route plans in real time, dynamically making allowance for the order situation. Additional orders received at short notice are taken into account from the outset, using optimisation algorithms and forecasting systems based on previous experience, for example, factoring in which areas most jobs come in at short notice.

The system re-jigs the route to take in these changes as efficiently as possible, and calculates how much extra time to allow.

When new jobs are received at short notice, the software calculates which driver can best take care of them and builds them into the schedule in a way that involves as few diversions as possible.

The planning software sees the big picture that it would be impossible for a single dispatcher to take in, considering all the vehicles, drivers and routes at the same time,” says Simroth. By coordinating the vehicles, we are able to utilise them as much as 30 percent more efficiently, particularly on local routes.”

The first prototype of the dynamic vehicle route planner will be ready for testing in day-to-day operations in 2008.