Solution to Bus Scheduling Problem: A Case Study of Metro Mass Transit Limited - Kumasi
Date
2012-10-19
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Abstract
The problem of bus scheduling involves determining the optimal route structure, span
of service, and service frequencies for the transit agency and assigning vehicles to the
routes. This involves considering cycle times, number of vehicles, timed transfers,
layover time and locations, recovery time, and any difference in weekday and
weekend services (Wren and Rousseau, 1995).
The problem is common due to its direct application to problems arising in industry
for example, vehicle routing and vehicle assignment and also for their contribution to
the solution methods for integer programming problems. Several exact algorithms
based on branch and bound, dynamic programming and heuristics have been proposed
to solve the Scheduling Problems.
This study formulates and solves the scheduling problem of the Metro Mass Transit
unit in the Ashanti region with respect to how scheduling should be managed for the
intra city, inter urban/rural urban and intercity routes. The use of integer linear
programming, specifically the branch and bound method is incorporated in this study.
The objective is to find an optimal bus schedule for the routes plied by Metro Mass
Transit buses.
Description
A thesis submitted to the Institute of Distance Learning, Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology in partial fulfilment of the requirement for the award of Master of Science degree in Industrial Mathematics.