Two-Echelon Vehicle Routing Problem: A satellite location analysis

In this paper, we address the Two-Echelon Vehicle Routing Problem (2E-VRP) in which freight is delivered from depots to intermediary satellites, from where it is delivered to customers. Different from other multi-level problems, the focus in 2E-VRP is on the global routing costs of the overall network. 2E-VRP has been recently introduced and, to our knowledge, there are no studies of the impact of instance parameters on the global cost. We present the results of a broad experimental study aimed at analyzing the impact on the total distribution cost of several parameters including customer distribution, satellites-location rules, depot location, number of satellites, mean accessibility of the satellites, and mean transportation cost between the satellites and the customers.