The relocation problem for the one‐way electric vehicle sharing

Abstract

Traditional car sharing services have been based on the two-way scheme, where the user picks up and returns the vehicle at the same parking station. Some innovative services permit also one-way trips, that is, the user is allowed to return the vehicle in another station. The one-way scheme is more attractive for the users, but may lead to an unbalance between the user demand, and the availability of vehicles or free lots at the stations. In such cases, the service provider could reallocate the fleet and restore a better distribution of the vehicles among the stations. In the case of electric car sharing, such a problem is more complex because the travel range depends on the level of the battery charge. This article presents a new approach for the relocation of electric vehicles (EVs), carried out by the staff of the service provider to keep the system balanced. Such an approach generates a challenging Paired Pickup and Delivery Problem with Time Windows with new features that to the best of our knowledge have never been considered in the literature. We call such a problem the EV relocation problem (EVRP). We yield a mixed integer linear programming (MILP) formulation of the EVRP and some techniques to speedup its solution through a state-of-the-art solver (CPLEX). Moreover, we develop a simple but effective heuristic based on such a formulation and four upper bound generation methods. We test the performances of both the MILP formulation and the heuristic on instances built on the Milan road network

Design and management of vehicle-sharing systems: a survey of algorithmic approaches

“…Redistribution of vehicles may also be provided by a fleet of limited capacity tow-trucks located at various network depots; using such an approach the problem can be conveniently modeled as pickup and delivery problem [8]. However, dedicated transport trucks are of little use in most urban settings due to stations not easily reachable by heavy-duty trucks and the time consuming vehicle loading/unloading operations [17]. Thus, the scheme most commonly encountered in practice engages teams of employed drivers who undertake the relocation of vehicles thereby significantly increasing operational cost.…”

Assessment of the Development of Time-Sharing Electric Vehicles in Shanghai and Subsidy Implications: A System Dynamics Approach

“…Electric vehicles and mobility sharing have attracted research attention from scholars across the academic spectrum, such as transportation (e.g., [14]), management (e.g., [15]), energy and environmental studies (e.g., [16]). From the energy and environment side, electric vehicles have been commonly proven to be greener compared to the conventional internal combustion engine vehicles (e.g., [17]).…”

Operations Research in Transportation and Supply Chain Management

“…The need for parking space can be also reduced through car sharing systems, where a car is pre-booked, used and returned to a parking station. One-way, with respect to two-way, systems provide more flexibility to users since cars can be dropped-off at any station (see, for instance, [10]). Research opportunities include the location of stations and cars, car relocation problems, coordination of reservations.…”