Freight Railroad Applications
The Less-than-Truckload freight (LTL) network design problem, and certain air cargo problems are very closely related to railroad shipment scheduling. See for example: Powell and Sheffi [1989]; Barklow, Graham, Hassler, Peck and Powell [1992]; Barnhart and Sheffi [1993]; Farvolden, Powell and Lustig [1993]; Jones, Lustig, Farvolden and Powell [1993]; Kwon [1994].
However, these models have cost minimizing formulations -- they do not take revenues, or in some cases even delivery time constraints into account. A true revenue management system should:
- Be based on a profit maximizing formulation
- Address optimal “load selection” in some manner, not just empty equipment repositioning.
Examples of true RM freight formulations include Powell’s [1988] work on optimal load selection for full truckload carriers, and Ph.D. dissertations by Campbell [1996] and Kraft [1997] on intermodal and railcar revenue management.