Multi-objective Management in Freight Logistics: Increasing Capacity, Service Level, Sustainability, and Safety with Optimization Algorithms, Second Edition

Multi-Objective Optimization for Modern Freight Logistics

Freight logistics faces a constant balancing act: moving goods efficiently while controlling cost, meeting service expectations, reducing environmental impact, and maintaining safety. This second edition of Multi-objective Management in Freight Logistics shows how optimization models can address those competing goals together rather than treating them as separate problems.

Written by Massimiliano Caramia and Paolo Dell’Olmo, the book combines methodological foundations with applications drawn from real logistics contexts. It is designed for readers who need to understand both the mathematical structure of multi-objective optimization and the practical choices involved in implementing models for freight systems.

What the Second Edition Adds

More than a decade after the first edition, the second edition reflects significant changes in logistics practice and research. The authors have added a chapter on green supply chain management and a chapter on heterogeneous fleet distribution models. They have also removed the earlier chapter on heterogeneous staff scheduling in logistics platforms, rewritten the introductory material, and incorporated central business district freight logistics as a section on the spatial structure of urban logistics.

Examples and implementation details have been introduced in the multi-objective optimization chapter, helping readers connect theoretical techniques to workable computational approaches.

Inside the Book

The six chapters move from broad context to specific modeling applications:

• Freight Logistics: An Overview — introduces current trends, logistics sprawl, central business district logistics, multi-stage logistics, and vehicle routing problems.
• Multi-objective Optimization — presents core definitions and solution concepts, including Pareto-optimality, scalarization, the ε-constraints approach, goal programming, multi-level programming, and metaheuristics.
• Green Supply Chain Management — examines green corridors, network design, and mathematical formulations for environmentally oriented logistics decisions.
• Maritime Freight Logistics — covers capacity and service level in maritime terminals, container allocation, and scheduling of inspection operations.
• Hazardous Material Transportation Problems — explores risk evaluation, risk equity, dissimilar paths, congested networks, and bi-level optimization approaches.
• Heterogeneous Fleets Distribution Models — discusses deliveries with drones in health emergencies, combined truck-and-drone fleets, and truck-and-bike fleets.

Methods and Implementation

Throughout the book, the authors emphasize models that decision-makers and practitioners can use. Mathematical formulations are paired with implementation details and experimental results where relevant, especially in chapters dealing with maritime logistics, hazardous materials, and heterogeneous fleets. The result is a text that treats optimization not as an abstract exercise but as a set of tools for planning, routing, scheduling, and network design.

The authors also keep students in mind. The preface notes an effort to make complex logistics questions understandable and to enrich the material with implementation codes, making the book suitable as a teaching resource for logistics-related disciplines.

Who This Book Is For

This edition is relevant to logistics managers, operations researchers, supply chain analysts, transportation planners, and graduate students working with optimization models. Readers with an interest in green logistics, maritime terminals, hazardous material transport, or emerging fleet configurations such as drones and bikes will find dedicated chapters that connect multi-objective methods to those domains.

If your work involves decisions where cost, service, sustainability, and safety must be weighed together, this book provides a structured and mathematically grounded way to approach them.