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Modeling and optimizing the evacuation of hospitals based on the MRCPSP with resource transfers

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EURO Journal on Computational Optimization

Abstract

In this paper, we consider the problem of hospital evacuation and model it as a multi-mode resource-constrained project scheduling problem (MRCPSP) with additional resource transfers and blockings. Based on this model two heuristic decomposition approaches are proposed. The first uses a tabu search algorithm for the mode assignment problem, the scheduling subproblem is solved by adapted serial and parallel schedule generation schemes using priority rules. The second is based on a decomposition into an evacuation and a routing subproblem where solutions are represented by resource flows. Computational experiments were performed for both approaches using randomly generated instances based on real-world scenarios.

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Acknowledgments

We gratefully acknowledge the help of two anonymous referees who gave several constructive comments to an earlier version of this paper.

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Correspondence to Sigrid Knust.

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Poppenborg, J., Knust, S. Modeling and optimizing the evacuation of hospitals based on the MRCPSP with resource transfers. EURO J Comput Optim 4, 349–380 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s13675-015-0061-8

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s13675-015-0061-8

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