Freight distribution in urban areas : a method to select the most important loading and unloading areas and a survey tool to investigate related demand patterns
- Submitting institution
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Coventry University
- Unit of assessment
- 32 - Art and Design: History, Practice and Theory
- Output identifier
- 40623167
- Type
- D - Journal article
- DOI
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10.1186/s12544-020-00430-w
- Title of journal
- European Transport Research Review
- Article number
- 40
- First page
- -
- Volume
- 12
- Issue
- 1
- ISSN
- 1867-0717
- Open access status
- Compliant
- Month of publication
- June
- Year of publication
- 2020
- URL
-
-
- Supplementary information
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-
- Request cross-referral to
- -
- Output has been delayed by COVID-19
- No
- COVID-19 affected output statement
- -
- Forensic science
- No
- Criminology
- No
- Interdisciplinary
- Yes
- Number of additional authors
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2
- Research group(s)
-
-
- Proposed double-weighted
- No
- Reserve for an output with double weighting
- No
- Additional information
- This research was undertaken as part of the SUITS (Supporting Urban Integrated Transport Systems: Transferable tools for authorities, http://www.suits-project.eu/) project led by Woodcock, and funded under the European Union’s Horizon 2020 Framework programme. SUITS seeks to increase the capacity of small to medium cities in Europe to plan sustainable, inclusive, safe and integrated transport.
Cities are observing increasing levels of urban freight activities leading to congestion and pollution. This study sought to develop new data driven approaches to enable Local Authorities to effectively observe freight flows based on demand. A spatial cluster analysis approach was designed, implemented and tested (in Turin, Italy) to understand the most important loading/unloading parking spots in an urban setting by processing the GPS traces of a fleet of logistic vehicles in order to develop a novel congestion Key Performance Indicator.
The research demonstrated how Local Authorities could integrate transport data and different methods to rapidly provide solutions to pressing, local transport problems. The congestion KPI and its application in Turin provides a way of monitoring the freight distribution patterns, finding congestion points, associating these with specific loading areas, and through observational studies, changing patterns of freight distribution. The approach informs urban design by provided understanding of loading and unloading areas and their impact on traffic flow, retail and wider urban planning. Turin has reorganized the loading and unloading of goods within the City’s low traffic zone, and enhanced the loading/unloading parking areas in the city centre. Their city traffic management centre now employs GPS tracking to guide improved loading/parking efficiency.
- Author contribution statement
- -
- Non-English
- No
- English abstract
- -