A Branch-and-price algorithm for a Vehicle Routing Problem with Cross-Docking

n this paper, we propose a reformulation and a Branch-and-price (BP) algorithm for the Vehicle Routing Problem with Cross-Docking (VRPCD). Our computational results indicate that the reformulation provides bounds much stronger than network flow bounds from previous studies. As a consequence, when BP and a Linear Programming based Branch-and-bound (LPBB) method (that relies on the network flow formulation) are run for the same restricted time limit, BP clearly dominates LPBB in terms of the quality of lower and upper bounds found during the search.