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7th IFAC Conference on Manufacturing Modelling, Management,

and Control
International Federation of Automatic Control
June 19-21, 2013. Saint Petersburg, Russia

Resource Availability Optimization for Green Courier Service


Agapios N. Platis* Vasilis P. Koutras**
Christoforos C. Salagaras***
Department of Financial and Management Engineering, University of the Aegean, Chios 82100, Greece
* (e-mail: platis@aegean.gr), ** (e-mail: v.koutras@ fme.aegean.gr)
*** (e-mail: fmem08001@fme.aegean.gr)

Abstract: In this paper an environmentally friendly bike messenger service with clients of different
priorities is modeled using Markov chains. The aim is to examine how operations resource availability
provided to the clients can be optimized. The paper proposes a methodology based on reserving resources
for higher priority classes. Based on data from a bike messenger company, the probabilities of each
clients class is optimized through a multi-objective optimization problem. The result is that the
company, or a similar one, could use the proposed methodology in order to maximize its services levels.
Keywords: Resource availability, optimization, resource reservation, Bicycle Messenger Service, Markov
Chains

when the delivery zone is Zone B. On the other hand, each


1. INTRODUCTION
day, the cyclists have to pick up request that can be delivered
In urban areas, with the raising cost of gas in addition to the the next day and in parallel deliver requests of the previous
large cities usual heavy traffic, the bicycle messenger service day. Thus, he should give priority to the request that have to
seems to be quite effective for the transportation of small be delivered sooner during the day and in longer distances.
packages reducing this way the overall cost and time for Obviously, the price of a long distance off-the-shelf or fast
clients, providing also an environmentally friendly service. A delivery is higher than a simple delivery or a next day
bike messenger service is generally available in metropolitan delivery. All of the above information can be found in the
areas for short-range lightweight deliveries. company web page http://bondexcouriers.com/ (in greek).
Based on the price of a service, the requests can be
In this paper, the case study refers to a Bicycle Messenger categorized into different classes, each one of different
Service company, called BONDEX that operates in Athens, priority. Higher priority classes should be served under any
Greece. The company provides courier services, delivering circumstances. Nevertheless, according to the companys
small packages, inside Attica basin either on the same or on data, the lower priority classes requests are enormously more
the next day. It employs cyclists who deliver clients requests than the higher prioritized requests. The basic aim of the
in a quite fast manner with respect to the environment. The company is to provide service to as many clients as possible.
clients, can vary from individuals to consortiums who need to But the increasing number of low priority request can lead to
be served very quickly. The price of this service depends on exhaustion of the available cyclists who deliver the request,
the pick up and delivery area and additionally on the service resulting hence in service unavailability for an oncoming
speed. Hence the Attica basin is divided into three zones: request.
Zone A which includes the center of the city of Athens, Zone
B which includes the suburbia of Athens, and Zone C which The Bicycle Messenger Service operation can be regarded as
includes the long distance areas of the Attica basin. For each a system that provides resources to clients of different
zone there are different levels of service. For Zone A, the priority classes (Koutras and Platis (2006)). Hence, the
delivery can be accomplished off-the-shelf during 45 minutes cyclists picking up and delivering the requests can be
from the time of pick up, during 90 minutes (fast delivery) or considered as resources that the system provides to its clients.
simply during the day of request (until 18:00a.m.). Exactly The company aims to serve as many clients as possible but
the same services are provided for Zone B. As far as for Zone simultaneously provide priority to the requests that attach a
C, the delivery can be fast, i.e. during 180 minutes, or simple, higher profit. Consequently, a trade off between higher
i.e. during the day. Furthermore, the company can serve priority classes demands on resource (cyclists) availability
requests to be delivered the day after the pickup. Notice that and serving as many clients as possible has to be
the next day request should be delivered until 18:00a.m. the distinguished in order not only to satisfy the client but also to
delivery day. According to the speed and the zone of delivery increase companys profit. To this direction, the concept of
and on whether delivery should be done on the same or the resource availability optimization with resource reservation is
next day, the price list is drawn up. From the company point adopted based on previous similar works in the literature
of view, not all the requests are of the same importance. For (Koutras and Platis (2009), Koutras et al (2008), Koutras and
example it is reasonable to give priority to the requests that Platis (2006) (2009), Koutras et al (2008), Koutras and Platis
should be delivered the same day and off-the-shelf, especially (2006)).

978-3-902823-35-9/2013 IFAC 1632 10.3182/20130619-3-RU-3018.00468


2013 IFAC MIM
June 19-21, 2013. Saint Petersburg, Russia

Through the past years, resource availability optimization continues to increase, additionally class 3 new requests are
gained a lot of research effort as far as computer system and not accepted. Finally, in order to provide high levels of
networks (Ha (1997), Haring et al (2001), Koutras et al resource availability to the highest priority class 1, if the
(2009), Xiao et al (2004)) and web services (Koutras and number of free cyclists is gracefully reduced, further class 2
Platis (2009), Koutras and Platis (2008), Koutras and Platis requests are not accepted. Class 1 do not experience any
(2006)) are concerned. Particularly when referring to server- denial of service until the system runs out of cyclists.
client systems availability demands are of prior importance.
Based on the existing literature for resource reservation on a
In many of the above client-server systems the concept of servers or a websites (Koutras and Platis (2009), Koutras and
assigning priorities among the users or client is also Platis (2008), Koutras and Platis (2006)) and guarded cells in
considered (Baldi and Ofek (2000), Koutras and Platis cellular networks (Haring et al (2001)), we propose to reserve
(2006), Chang and Kim (2001), Vu and Zukerman (2002)). In cyclists that can be used only for higher priority classes
such systems, not only the needs of availability are requests. Nevertheless, reserving cyclists for high priority
augmented in order to provide a satisfactory level of service, classes will eventually cause a denial of service for lower
but furthermore the high priority clients have to be served in priority classes. To counteract this problem, a trade off
a more efficient way than others. From the service provider between higher priority classes demands on resource
point of view, resource availability has to be provided to as availability and serving as many requests of lower priority
many clients as possible and simultaneously higher levels of classes as possible, has to be distinguished.
resources availability have to be guaranteed for the high
priority users. Consequently there has to be a trade off on Optimization techniques are used for determining this trade
how to provide available resources among users or clients. off. The optimization consists in minimizing the probability
that a request can no longer be accepted into the system,
2. MODELING THE SERVICE PROCESS (Ioannou et al (2002), Lee and Orda (2004)), so called
blocking probability (Haring et al (2001), Farag (2008)).
Thus our aim is to minimize simultaneously the blocking
2.1 System description probability of all the requests classes through a
multiobjective optimization problem.
Consider the service process of the request that arrive each
day to the companys call centre. The company should
provide cyclists (resources) in order to serve the requests. 2.2 Modeling arrivals, service and resource reservation
The requests are of different priorities according to the day of
deliver, the zone and the desired speed of delivery. Actually, The concept of reserving an amount of system resources, in
all of the above criteria modulate the price of serving each other word a number of cyclists for each of the priority
request. Consequently, each request is assigned with a classes is adopted. Let assume that the number of cyclists that
priority. According to BONDEXs price list the requests are are reserved for class 1 is denoted by g3. This indicates that g3
divided into four different classes: class 1, 2, 3, 4 with cyclists can serve only requests of class 1. Correspondingly,
descending priority. Each cyclist is charged with a single for class 2, g2 cyclists are reserved and finally g1 cyclists are
request that has to pick up and deliver (delivery is made only reserved for class 3. Note that there are no reserved resources
for the requests referred to the same day). Additionally, let us for the lowest priority class 4, consisting of the next day
assume that the company can provide every day N cyclists. A deliveries. For a detailed description of the methodology
cyclist is considered available when he is not charged with adopted, let us define a stochastic process Z(t) which denotes
any request. Once the cyclist is assigned a request and drives the number of available cyclists at time t. Then {Z(t), t 0}
to pick it up, is considered as occupied. He will become is a birth-death process. The state space of the model is
available again when he will deliver the package. The N defined by the set E, which is divided into four subsets. E1
cyclists should serve requests of all priorities, but class 1 subset is the subset of states (number of cyclists) that can
requests should be served under any circumstances if there is serve all requests, independently of the class, E2 is the subset
an available cyclist. Due to the descending priories, more the of reserved cyclists for classes 3, 2 and 1 and E3 of cyclists
cyclists should be assigned with class 1 requests, fewer with for classes 2 and 1. Finally E4 denotes the subset of states that
class 2 requests and so on. Finally class 4, consisting of next correspond to the cyclist who serve only class 1 requests.
day deliveries, can be served by less cyclists than classes 3, 2 Hence E1, E2, E3, E4 form a partition of state space E.
or 1. The aforementioned access of request to cyclists ensures In Figure 1 the transition state diagram describing the number
that the company should almost always be able to serve the of available cyclists is depicted. State i represents the case
higher priority classes. where i cyclists are available. Thus, state N stands for the
A problem arises when there is an increased demand for case where no request has arrived at the system and hence no
cyclist to serve requests. In this case, the number of available cyclist is occupied, though state 0 depicts the case when all
cyclists diminishes and in exceptional scenarios the company the cyclists are busy serving requests. Since g3 cyclists are
may run out of cyclists. When such conditions are detected, reserved for class 1, in the cases where i (i = 1to g3), cyclists
cyclists should be provided according to the priorities are available, the system accepts only class 1 new requests.
assigned. Hence when the number of available cyclists Accordingly, in states where j (j = g3 + 1 to g3 + g2) are
decreases, as a first step, further new requests of class 4 are available, only class 1 and class 2 new requests are accepted.
not accepted into the system. If the demand for cyclist In states where j = g3 + g2 + 1 to g3 + g2+ g1 (= G)

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2013 IFAC MIM
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Fig.1.State transition diagram.

cyclists are available, only class 1, class 2 and class 3 new iE i = 1, has to be solved, where Q = [qij](i,j)ExE is the
requests are accepted. Finally, when the available cyclists (N+1) by (N+1) transition rate matrix, with qij denoting the
vary from G + 1 to N, requests of all classes are accepted. transition rate from state i to state j and N + 1= dim E
denoting the number of states. According to the definition of
Resource reservation should take place according to the blocking probabilities, analytic formulas can be derived
priorities. Hence, the number g3 of reserved cyclists for class for each class:
1 is higher than g2 which is the number of reserved cyclists G g 2 + g3 g3

for class 2 which in turn is higher than the reserved cyclists Pb, class 4 = ,
i=0
i Pb, class 3 = ,
i=0
i Pb, class 2 = ,
i=0
i Pb, c lass 1 = 0 (2)
g1 for class 1. Thus, g3 > g2 > g1 and in order for the system to
provide at least one cyclist to each class, we assume g1 1. Thus, formulas for the blocking probabilities for each class
can be derived by equation (2). The blocking probabilities are
Let us now assume that the requests arrive to the system functions the cyclists reservation policy (g1, g2, g3):
according to a Poisson process, a fact that can model the real
arrival procedure very well. Let the parameter of the Poisson N(G+1)2g1 3g2 4g3 +1 (3)
Pb,class1 = 1

process for class 1 users is class 1. Similarly let class 2, class 3 N(G+1) 1 g1 1 g2 1 g g3 1 g g +1
1+ 1 1
+ N(G+1) 2 2 + g1 3 3 + 3 2 4 4 + 2 3
and class 4 be the Poisson parameters for the arrival processes 1 1 1 2 1 2 3 1 4 1 3 4

of classes 2, 3 and 4. Let the time that a cyclist needs to g3 1
accomplish a request is exponentially distributed with 4 + g3
N(G+1)2g1 3g2 4
4 1 4

1

(4)
parameters class 1, class 2, class 3 and class 4 for classes 1, 2, 3 Pb,class2 = N (G+1)

1 N(G+1) 1 1 g 2 1 g 3 1 g g +1
g g g
and 4 correspondingly. Although this is not the case for all 1 3
1+ 1 1 + 2 1 + 2 3 1 + 3 4 1 + 3 4
2 3 2 4 2
1 1 1

the classes, an exponential service time can be a very good 2 3 4

approximation for the time during which a cyclist serves a g2 1


g3 1
N(G+1)2g1 3g2 4
4 + 4g3 + 3 3
request of any class. Under these assumptions, the process 1 1 3 1 (5)
4
{Z(t), t 0} is a continuous time Markov chain (CTMC). Pb,class3 = N(G+1)
1 g1 1 g2
4g3 1 g2 g3 +1
N (G+1) g1 3 1 g2
Notice that since, the total number of requests in a daily basis 1+ 1 1
+ 2 2 + 3 + 3 4 +
1 1 1 2 1 2 3 1 4 1 3 4

for a rather long time interval of 21 months is known, a
common service rate , which is a weighted sum of the g3 1 g2 1 g1 1

N(G+1) 2g1 3g2 4 4 + 4g3 + 3 3 + 2 2
corresponding rate for each class, can be used to express the 1
4 1



3 1 2 1 (6)

Pb,class4 =
rate of serving a request of any class. From the above, the N(G+1) 1 g1 1 g2 1 g g3 1 g g +1
arrival rate for the process Z(t) is state dependent, with (i) 1+ 1 1
+ N(G+1) 2 2 + g1 3 3 + 2 4 4 + 2 3
1 1 1 2 1 2 3 1 3

4 1 3 4

denoting the rate of a request arrival in state i.:
where i = i / , i = 1, 2, 3, 4. Hence, the optimal reservation
4 = class1 , g3 + 1 i 0
policy g1, g2, g3 that minimizes the probability of a class
= + , g 2 + g3 + 1 i g3 + 2 (1) denial of service, with respect to priorities, can be determined
(i) = 3 class1 class2
2 = class1 + class2 + class3 , G + 1 i g 2 + g3 + 2 according to equations (1), (2), (3) and (4).
1 = class1 + class2 + class3 + class4 , N iG+2
2.3 Optimization problem formulation
Recall that our aim is to determine a cyclist reservation
policy that could provide cyclist with priority to class 1 For simultaneously minimizing all the blocking probabilities
requests and simultaneously provide as many cyclists as we formulate a multiobjective optimization problem which
possible to the other classes of requests, always according to reflects the trade off between assuring high level resource
the priorities assigned. Hence, we have to reserve cyclists in a availability for class 1 and at the same time providing as
manner that will minimize the blocking probability of all many cyclists as possible to the rest of the classes (Andersson
classes. Consequently, the blocking probability of each class (2001), Wieselthier et al (2002)). The objective function to be
has to be computed in the long run, based on the stationary minimized is the blocking probability of class 1. The rest of
distribution of the state probabilities of the CTMC Z(t). the blocking probabilities are involved in the constraints of
the problem. More specifically, in order to assure a
For the computation of the stationary distribution of the predefined level of cyclist availability for the rest of the
above process, the known linear system of equations Q = 0, classes, constraints indicating that the blocking probability of

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each class does not exceed this level are considered. The class1 = SDC2 + SDB3 =0.02236h-1, class2 = SDB2 + SDA3 +
problem is solved with respect to the number of reserved SDC1 = 0.02158h-1, class3 = SDA2 + SDB1 + SDA1 = 0.04212h-1,
cyclists g1, g2, g3 for classes 3, 2 and 1 correspondingly. class4= ND = 0.1565 h-1. As far as the service rates, each rate
depends on the duration of the service. Hence, we
In our case, the optimization problem is formulated according approximate an immediate service with a rate 4/3 h-1, a fast
to equations (3)-(6) indicating the blocking probabilities of service with rate 2/3 h-1 and a fast delivery to Zone C with
each class: 1/3 h-1. For simple deliveries we take into account that that a
min Pb,class 1(g 1 ,g 2 ,g 3 ) package can be delivered from 10:00pm to 18:00 am with the
such that Pb,class 2 Pb,class 2 ,0 same probability. In a similar manner, zone A simple
Pb,class 3 Pb,class 3 ,0 deliveries are assumed to have 3 hours of mean duration,
zone B simple of 4 hours and Zone C simple deliveries of 5
Pb,class 4 Pb,class 4 ,0 (7)
hours indicating hence the corresponding service rates of 1/3
g1 + g 2 + g 3 < N 1 h-1, 1/4 h-1 and 1/5 h-1 respectively. Finally, since during a day
g1 < g 2 , g 2 < g 3 , 1 g1 some previous day requests have to be served and
g1 ,g 2 ,g 3 : integers additionally some next day requests have to be collected, all
of them intended to be delivered until 18:00am of the
where Pb,class2,0, Pb,class3,0, Pb,class4,0 are the predefined levels for
delivery day, we assume that the rate of serving a next day
the blocking probabilities of classes 2, 3 and 4
request is 1/5 h-1. Consequently the service rate of each
correspondingly, beyond which these probabilities are desired
priority class can be now determined: class1 = SDC2 + SDB3 =
to be eliminated. According to the priorities assigned, the
5/3 h-1, class2 = SDB2 + SDA3 + SDC1 = 21/15 h-1, class3 =
number of reserved cyclists for class 1 has to be more than
SDA2 + SDB1 + DA1 = 15/12 h-1, class4= ND = 1/5 h-1. Recall
the corresponding one for class 2 and this is the reason for the
the assumption that each cyclist delivers the assigned
existence of the constraint g 2 < g 3 . The number of reserved package and becomes available again independently of the
cyclists for class 2 is also higher than those of class 3 and class he is serving, with a state independent common rate .
hence g1 < g 2 . In order to provide at least one cyclist to class Nevertheless, in order to capture the fact that it is more
4, the total number of reserved cyclists G is supposed to be probable for a cyclist to serve a class with a higher arrival
less than N 1. Finally, we have to reserve at least one cyclist frequency, we assume that is a weighted sum of the service
for class 3 and hence 1 g1 . rates for each class: = p1class1 + p2class2 + p3class3 +
p4class1 = 0.624345 h-1, where pi = (total number of class i
According to the literature, there are various algorithms that request) / (total number of requests) for the whole 21 months
can solve optimization problems of integer multiobjective period. Having computed all the appropriate parameter values
programming (Alves and Climaco (2000), Sarker et al with the real data and assuming that the potential number of
(2002)). The optimization problem in this paper is solved cyclist each day is N = 15, equations (3) to (6) provide the
based on Nelder-Mead method, supplemented by differential blocking probabilities of each class with respect to the
evolution (Wolfram Mathematica 5). The solution provides number of reserved cyclists for each class. Given the
the optimal cyclists reservation policy that minimizes the predefined levels Pb,class2,0, Pb,class3,0, Pb,class4,0 for the blocking
blocking probability for class 1 and simultaneously optimizes probabilities of classes 2, 3 and 4, the optimization problem
the rest of the blocking probabilities. of equation (7) can be now solved, in order to determine the
optimal reservation policy (g1*, g2*, g3*) which optimizes
3. NUMERICAL APPLICATION simultaneously all the blocking probabilities. Using the
optimal solution, the company could design a plan of
The BONDEX company, provides mail delivery on the same reserving cyclists so as to provide a satisfying level of
or on the next day inside a certain area using exclusively availability to all the types and classes or requests, improving
cyclist as couriers. This is a major difference between hence its reliability and reputation.
BONDEX and a usual courier company that can combine
different means of transportation and moreover deliver mail The results of the optimization problem for different
all around the country or even abroad. For 21 months the predefined levels are shown in Table 2. In Figure 2 the
company has served 3720 requests for over 50 different blocking probability for each class with respect to the
clients. In Table 1, the zones and types of service are shown predefined levels and the number of reserved cyclists is
along with an acronym that we assigned to each service in shown. We can observe that changing simultaneously the
order to easily categorize the services into priority classes. predefined levels can cause an important percentage change
on the optimal blocking probabilities of each class.
According to the profit of each service, the priority classes According to Table 2, all of the changes affect mostly the
are formulated. Hence, class 1 providing a profit 20 number of reserved cyclists for class 1 and the free cyclists.
includes requests of types SDC2 and SDB3, class 2 with 10 The first incurs a percentage change on P*b,class1. In practice,
profit < 20 includes types SDB2, SDA3 and SDC1, class class 1 is never blocked since the solution indicates that most
3 with 7.5 profit < 10 includes types SDA2, SDB1, of the cyclists should be reserved for this class. On the other
SDA1, though class 4 includes all the next day delivery types hand, it should be noticed that when the predefined levels for
due to their low priority. By the daily data provided by priority classes 1, 2, 3 become more stringent, the blocking
BONDEX from November 2010 to August 2012, we probability of class 4 is importantly reduced. This is of major
managed to identify the arrival rate of each class as follows: importance due the size of class 4 requests.

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In order to investigate the behavior of our model in the case REFERENCES


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(European Social Fund ESF) and Greek national funds through the (2002). Application of optimization techniques to a nonlinear
Operational Program "Education and Lifelong Learning" of the problem of communication network design with nonlinear
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cooperation and for the data provided. 543550.

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Table 1. BONDEX services


Zone Type Duration
same day delivery
A simple until 18:00 am SDA1
A fast 90 min SDA2
A immediate 45 min SDA3
B simple until 18:00 am SDB1
B fast 90 min SDB2
B immediate 45 min SDB3
C simple until 18:00 am SDC1
C fast 180 min SDC2
next day delivery
A simple until 18:00 am
B simple until 18:00 am ND
C simple until 18:00 am

Table 2. Optimal solutions


(Pb,class2,0, Pb,class3,0, Pb,class4,0) P*b,class1 g* free cyclists P*b,class2 P*b,class3 P*b,class4
(0.005, 0.05, 0.5) 7.4210-20 (1,2,11) 1 2.2110-5 0.009068 0.12912
(0.003, 0.03, 0.3) 7.4210-20 (1,2,11) 1 2.2110-5 0.009068 0.12912
(0.005, 0.01, 0.1) 6.3910-19 (1,2,10) 2 6.8210-6 0.002798 0.03983
(0.0005, 0.005, 0.05) 6.3810-19 (1,2,10) 2 6.8210-6 0.002798 0.03983
(0.0003, 0.003, 0.03) 6.4110-18 (1,2,9) 3 2.4510-6 0.001006 0.01433
(0.0003, 0.001, 0.01) 6.7610-18 (1,2,8) 4 9.2610-7 0.000380 0.05411
doubled request traffic
(0.005, 0.05, 0.5) 7.5710-17 (1,2,11) 1 3.1910-4 0.033855 0.24667
(0.003, 0.03, 0.3) 5.5410-16 (2,3,9) 1 1.2010-5 0.009117 0.26695
(0.005, 0.01, 0.1) 3.4210-14 (2,3,7) 3 3.8010-6 0.002887 0.08454
(0.0005, 0.005, 0.05) 4.1510-13 (1,2,7) 5 4.1610-6 0.004891 0.03506
(0.0003, 0.003, 0.03) 3.1510-11 (2,3,4) 6 1.2810-6 0.000978 0.02894
(0.0002, 0.002, 0.0) 4.4710-10 (1,2,4) 8 1.8310-5 0.001938 0.01389

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Fig. 2. Optimal cyclists reservation policies for the initial Fig. 3. Optimal cyclists reservation policies for the double
problem according to predefined levels. request traffic according to predefined

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(a)
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(b) (c)

Fig. 4. Optimal cyclists reservation policies for the initial problem for Pb,class2,0, Pb,class3,0, Pb,class4,0 changes

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