Research Reports from the Department of Operations
Document Type
Report
Publication Date
6-1-1974
Abstract
There are N persons in an organization who are potential candidates for car pooling. Subjective estimates of (i) the probability that individual, i, breaks the pool he is in on any given day and (ii) the conditional probability that he will take his car to work, given that he has broken his pool on any given day, are available. Breaking or missing the pool occurs when a person is late, or has to go elsewhere or is ill, etc. Thus, missing the pool is a random event. A person's decision to take his own car instead of the pool also depends on a number of factors, such as availability of the car, convenience of using other modes of transportation, etc. Thus, the event that a person takes his car is also probabilistic. In what follows, we will prove some lemmas and theorems which characterize the conditions under which pools are to be formed. These lead us to an algorithm for pool formation. First we shall consider the case of a simple pool of unlimited size, and then pools of equal size, and finally pools of unequal size.
Keywords
Operations research, Car pools, Transportation--Mathematical models, Probabilities
Publication Title
Technical Memorandums from the Department of Operations, School of Management, Case Western Reserve University
Issue
Technical memorandum no. 337
Rights
This work is in the public domain and may be freely downloaded for personal or academic use
Recommended Citation
Chandrasekaran, R. and Subba Rao, S., "A Car Pooling Problem" (1974). Research Reports from the Department of Operations. 71.
https://commons.case.edu/wsom-ops-reports/71