Modeling and Analysis for Hazardous Materials Transportation: Risk Analysis, Routing/Scheduling and Facility Location

TLDR

The paper surveys hazardous materials transportation research in risk analysis, routing/scheduling, and facility location, and identifies key challenges for future study. The review focuses on methodological studies since 1980, limited to land‑based truck and rail transport, and examines work that integrates risk analysis with routing and routing with facility location. The review shows a shift from single‑criterion to multiobjective models and an emerging focus on outcome distributions instead of expected values.

Abstract

We survey research on hazardous materials transportation in the areas of risk analysis, routing/scheduling and facility location. Our focus is primarily on work done since 1980, and on research which is methodological rather than empirical. We also limit our focus to transport by land-based vehicles (truck and rail), excluding pipeline, air and maritime movements. The review traces the evolution of models from single-criterion optimizations to multiobjective analyses, and highlights the emerging direction of dealing explicitly with distributions of outcomes, rather than simply optimizing expected values. We also indicate examples of work which integrate risk analysis with routing, and routing with facility location. We conclude with a discussion of several aspects of hazardous materials transportation which offer important challenges for further research.