Hybrid Ant Colony Algorithm For Logistics Distribution Problem With Time Windows

With the prosperity of economy,the demands of enterprises for logistics enterprises are increasing dramatically,the service quality are becoming more and more demanding.To make itself more competitive the logistics enterprise need to improve the service quality and reduce the transportation cost.Firstly,this paper regard the problem the logistics enterprise facing as the Vehicle Routing Problem with Time Windows(VRPTW).A mathematical model with multi-objective function is established,including minimizing fixed cost,variable cost and time punishment.Aiming at making the customers satisfied with the service of logistics enterprises and to save cost.The results are kept in which meet the constraint conditions of the optimal driving scheme.A new hybrid Ant Colony Algorithm(ACO-GAF)established by combining the Genetic Algorithm(GA)with Ant Colony Optimization Algorithm(ACO).To satisfied the demand of VRPTW,add time and capacity factor's influence to the state transition probability formula of ACO.To improve the precision of the algorithm and accelerate the algorithm convergence speed in the late,join the Fish operator in late of genetic algorithm.Then merging the group results of GA and ACO,choosing the best individual after calculating the fitness function,and then update the optimal path pheromone.Solve the Solomon RC series of numerical examples on MATLAB platform,set appropriate parameter values,regard the shortest path as the goal,compared the results of ACO-GAF with the current optimal solution,the most examples has made certain progress on vehicle saving.In addition,the results shows that the ACO-GAF algorithm is effective and feasible by comparing the results of GA,ACO,and Fish Swarm Algorithm respectively.The optimization efficiency and optimization results of ACO-GAF algorithm are superior than the GA,ACO and FSA.Finally,applying the VRPTW mathematical model in the problem that is about manufacturer distribute goods for supermarkets.Solving the Vehicle Routing Problem by ACO-GAF,the results getting optimized in the total distance,late penalty fee,multi-objective function results better than the originals' results.The result shows that the ACO-GAF has certain practicality by applying the mathematical model for VRPTW.