Assignment of cells to switches in PCS networks

Considers a problem of network design of personal communication services (PCS). The problem is to assign cells to the switches of a PCS network in an optimum manner. The authors consider two types of costs. One is the cost of handoffs between cells. The other is the cost of cabling (or trunking) between a cell site and its associated switch. The problem is constrained by the call volume that each switch can handle. The authors formulate the problem exactly as an integer programming problem. They also propose a heuristic solution for this problem and show that it performs extremely well