Exact and Approximate Solution of Constrained Dynamic Combinatorial Problems in Space

Abstract

In a recent issue of this Journal the author confronted an important set of spatial combinatorial problems of a sequential nature and suggested a method to obtain approximate solutions rather efficiently (Kuenne [4]). In that article the problem is defined formally; its structural resemblances to the transportation, travelling salesman, and weighted set covering problems were discussed, and several examples were solved heuristically. Although existing combinatorial approaches such as branch and bound were mentioned briefly, and a role assigned them in the approximative algorithm, the view was expressed that such paths to exact solution were infeasible computationally.

Published originally in the Journal of Regional Science, 12 (1972), pp. 1–22, and reproduced with permission.