Identifying the shortest log trucking routes and optimizing those constrained by low-weight bridges in Mississippi

Timber haulage in Mississippi incurs the greatest portion of logging expenses because of a myriad of closed and posted (restricted) bridges. This study utilized Dijkstra\u27s algorithm method in ArcGIS Pro to derive 129 feasible shortest optimal trucking routes between 46 harvest sites and 32 softwood sawmills in Mississippi. Among these routes, 30 of them had restricted bridges along the way; however, only 13 viable alternative routes were identified due to distance and weight restrictions. The additional trucking distance for alternative routes ranged between 1.5 to 12.9 miles, whose effect on transportation cost was determined using a Mixed Integer Linear Programming optimization model incorporating weight limits of the restricted bridges. Restricted bridges along optimal routes resulted in an additional transportation cost of $4.09 million, representing a 4.07% increase in total transportation cost or 0.34 per ton of softwood sawlogs transported. All these cost increases were exclusive to softwood sawlogs