Add capacity to location allocation solver

Question

Hi all,

Currently, i'm researching the possible container locations in a specific area for a large set of demand points. These containers have all the same capacity. By using 'maximize capacitated coverage' i'm aiming for a high efficiency for each container and i'm able to set a certain capacity. However, i actually want to find the least amount of containers to serve the whole area. Therefore, i would preferably use 'maximize attendance and minimize facilities'. Unfortunately it is not possible to add a capacity to this solver. Or is there a way to do so? Could someone help me with this problem?

Hankvan_Toor · Answer

Thank you Jay for your comment. That is actually what i did. It felt like there should be a better way than these iterations.

JaySandhu · Answer

Maximize attendance is probably not the best problem type for container locations. It is meant for retail locations like fast food and has a linear decay in "attendance" up to the specified Cutoff.

>i actually want to find the least amount of containers to serve the whole area.

I would say use a bracketing approach to run the Location-Allocation solver with the Maximize Capacitated Coverage a few times to narrow down the minimum number of facilities needed to serve your demand.

Jay Sandhu