The Robustness of Two Common Heuristics for the p-Median Problem

Optimal p-median solutions were computed for six test problems on a network of forty-nine demand nodes and compared with solutions from two heuristic algorithms. Comparison of the optimal solutions with those from the Teitz and Bart heuristic indicates that this heuristic is very robust. Tests of the Maranzana heuristic, however, indicate that it is efficient only for small values of p(numbers of facilities) and that its robustness decreases rapidly as problem size increases.