Syllabus

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Introduction

Welcome to Logistical and Transportation Planning Methods (a. k. a. "Urban OR"). This year it will be taught by Professor Arnold I. Barnett, Professor Richard C. Larson and Professor Amedeo R. Odoni. (Professor Larson is on sabbatical leave this year. Although he has kindly volunteered to still give four of the lectures, his involvement with the course will otherwise be limited.)

Course Description

The class will cover quantitative techniques of Operations Research with emphasis on applications in transportation systems analysis (urban, air, ocean, highway, pick-up and delivery systems) and in the planning and design of logistically oriented urban service systems (e.g., fire and police departments, emergency medical services, emergency repair services). It presents a unified study of functions of random variables, geometrical probability, multi-server queueing theory, spatial location theory, network analysis and graph theory, and relevant methods of simulation. There will be discussion focused on the difficulty of implementation, among other topics.

The textbook will be:

Larson, Richard C., and Amedeo R. Odoni. Urban Operations Research. Belmont, MA: Dynamic Ideas, 2007. ISBN: 0975914634.

The old edition of the textbook (Prentice Hall, 1981) is available online.

The course will be graded on the basis of two class quizzes (scheduled for Lecture 13 and Lecture 25) and approximately six problem sets. Homework counts for approximately one-third of your final grade. Moreover, doing the homework is essential preparation for the quizzes.