A new extension of the RCPSP in a multi-site context: Mathematical model and metaheuristics

- A RCPSP extension: the multisite RCPSP with scheduling dependent transportation times.
- A MILP for multi site RCPSP including conditional minimum time lags.
- Solution approaches: proposition and comparison of 4 individual based metaheuristics.

This article proposes an extension of the Resource Constrained Project Scheduling Problem: the multi-site RCPSP with resource pooling between several sites. This extension considers new constraints for the RCPSP like transportation times and choice of the site where tasks are performed. A linear program of this problem is given. Four approximate methods are described: Local Search, Simulated Annealing and Iterated Local Search with two different acceptance criteria: Simulated Annealing type acceptance criterion and Better Walk acceptance criterion. We compare the results obtained with each method. The best results are obtained with Simulated Annealing and Iterated Local Search metaheuristics.