Supply chains and transportation networks

Abstract

We overview some of the major advances in supply chains and transportation networks, with a focus on their common theoretical frameworks and underlying behavioral principles. We emphasize that the foundations of supply chains as network systems can be found in the regional science and spatial economics literature. In addition, transportation network concepts, models, and accompanying methodologies have enabled the advancement of supply chain network models from a system-wide and holistic perspective. We discuss how the concepts of system optimization and user optimization have underpinned transportation network models and how they have evolved to enable the formulation of supply chain network problems operating (and managed) under centralized or decentralized, that is, competitive, decisionmaking behavior. We highlighted some of the principal methodologies, including variational inequality theory, that have enabled the development of advanced transportation network equilibrium models as well as supply chain network equilibrium models.