Comprehensive Approximate Sequential Tool for Public Service System Design

This paper deals with the approximate approach to the p-median problem, which constitutes a background for the public service system design. The real instances are characterized by thousands of possible service center locations. The attempts at exact solving of these problems often fail due to enormous computational time or huge memory demands, when the location-allocation model is used. The presented approach uses an approximation of a common distance by some pre-determined distances given by so-called dividing points. Covering formulation of the problem enables the implementation of the solving technique in the frame of commercial optimization software to obtain near-optimal solution in a short term. As the deployment of the dividing points influences the accuracy of the solution, we have developed the sequential method of dividing point deployment. The main goal of this study is to explore the effectiveness of suggested approximate method measured by the solution accuracy in comparison to the sav ed computational time.