On a 40-stop suburban route, sequencing by 2-hour customer windows and running a clockwise loop around the densest cluster cut our miles by 12% and saved about 35 minutes last Friday. If you don’t have a dispatcher doing this, which on-phone app lets you lock time windows and auto-sequence — I’ve had solid results with RoadWarrior but want to hear what’s working for you.
I’ve had better luck with Circuit on-phone — set ‘time windows’ and service times, pin a couple priority stops, then let it auto-sequence; on my 42-stop Friday loop it shaved about 30 minutes by pushing school zones earlier. Caveat: if you hard-lock too many windows it can zigzag like Tetris, so I only lock the earliest/latest and let the rest float.
Been rolling with Route4Me on-phone; it lets me lock 2‑hour windows, add service times, and auto‑sequence — on a 41‑stop suburban loop it cut about 25 minutes when I kept the pass clockwise like you. Pro tip: set apartments to 4–5 min service and flag first‑window drops as “priority” so it doesn’t bounce back later, @jameson54. Small caveat: , the hard‑window toggle can force dumb detours, so I leave a couple tight ones soft if traffic’s ugly.