Route & Scheduling Tool for Social Good

With the restriction of people's movement small businesses which previously relied on visiting customers now find themselves having to explore the option of delivering to the customer home address to survive. Small businesses do not have much in the way of staff resources nor the logistical support and tools of larger companies, at present they would be relying on consumer satnav which offer A to B routing. Similarly,the volunteer army for delivering supplies to vulnerable people will require local groups to coordinate shifts and area coverage.Suboptimal routing will increase staff time, fuel usage and emissions, costing money and reducing the number of customers businesses and volunteers can reach and support with their resources. With reduced public transport, coordinating staff access to hospital and critical care is also a key issue.

Our project develops an optimal routing and scheduling tool for localised deliveries to help businesses and volunteers efficiently and effectively serve their communities. The routing tool will also help understand which services need to be maintained to provide access to hospitals, and provide optimal car-pooling for key health-care staff.