Optimising pathology logistics with shared-fleet passenger and freight services: a case study on the Isle of Wight, UK

Abstract

This study presents an optimisation algorithm to solve a collaborative vehicle routing problem with time windows. The algorithm was developed and tested on a real-world case study to investigate the potential for a shared-fleet operation involving public or-ganisations, specifically, the Isle of Wight Council (IWC) and the National Health Service (NHS). The aim was to evaluate whether collaborative use of public-sector vehicles could reduce total fleet size, operational costs, and vehicle-kilometres travelled, while main-taining existing service levels. The study develops a two-stage optimisation algorithm that incorporates real-world constraints such as vehicle capacity, time windows, and pre-assigned mandatory stops. The first stage maximises the number of assignable col-laborative tasks across fleets, while the second stage minimises the total travel cost con-ditional on this maximum assignment. Using historical data and a novel optimisation algorithm, vehicle movements were modelled to evaluate benefits in terms of cost sav-ings, reduced CO2 emissions and vehicle usage. The case study results generated by the algorithm suggested that considerable improvements could be made by integrating pa-tient diagnostic collection rounds into the existing IWC minibus routes: (a 10.6% reduc-tion in CO2 emissions (644 kg/month) and vehicle kilometres (2300 km/month), a 20.2% reduction in working hours (219 h/month), and a 17.8% saving in cost (GBP (£) 3596/month) leading to IWC gaining a potential additional revenue of GBP (£) 54,829 annually while reducing costs by 22.4% for the NHS. The findings highlighted the poten-tial benefits of shared fleet collaborations between public sector organisations, offering a model for similar collaborations in other public sector contexts.

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Identifiers

ORCID for Ismail Aydemir: orcid.org/0000-0002-7847-1801

ORCID for Tom Cherrett: orcid.org/0000-0003-0394-5459

ORCID for Antonio Martinez-Sykora: orcid.org/0000-0002-2435-3113

ORCID for Fraser Mcleod: orcid.org/0000-0002-5784-9342

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