Using Integer Programming to Solve the Train Platforming Problem
Résumé
We consider the problem of assigning trains to the available tracks at a railway station, given the daily timetable and the structural and operational constraints. This train platforming problem is a key problem in railway station operations and, for a large station, many working days are required for an expert planner to construct the train platforming. This problem was studied in (De Luca Cardillo and Mione, 1998) where it is formulated as a coloring graph problem. These authors propose to solve it by an efficient heuristic algorithm combined with reduction techniques. In this paper we show that integer programming is a very interesting tool to exactly solve the train platforming problem formulated as in (De Luca Cardillo and Mione, 1998) by a coloring graph problem. The fact of being able to solve it in an exact way by using an integer programming solver has obviously many advantages. Some computational results are reported.