Let the optimizer run ‘avoid tolls’ from Gary to Joliet at 6:10 a.m.; dodged a $3.85 gate, added 27 miles and two school zones, then we landed 42 minutes late and spent $47 more on fuel. What’s your funniest false-economy route, and did you cap detours by cost per mile after?
, that avoid-tolls at 6:10 a.m. is a trap — save $3.85 and eat 42 minutes. I fixed this by gating it: allow toll-avoid only if the detour is under $0.12/mile and under 15 min, plus a 7–9 a.m. school-zone penalty; ATRI’s CPM is a decent baseline if you need a number: https://truckingresearch.org. Want a snippet to auto-flip to tolls when added miles > 25?
Been burned the same way — 6:10 a.m. “avoid tolls” loves school zones, . I fixed it by auto-disabling toll-avoid from 6–9 a.m. and only skipping a gate if toll < detour_miles × CPM + driver_time_cost, using ATRI’s ops cost as the CPM baseline (https://truckingresearch.org/tag/operational-costs). Do you have a way to add a time-of-day penalty or a “no local detours within 30 min of appointment” rule?