MOSCA - Decision Support System For Integrated Door-To-Door Delivery: Planning and Control in Logistic Chains
Overview
Background & policy context:
Transport is an essential service in any society. Goods transportation ensures that products can be shipped from factories to markets. With increasing traffic volumes in urban areas and resulting traffic congestion, it is becoming difficult for freight transport to get into urban center areas. Goods transport in cities represents from 10 to 18% of the road traffic causing 40% of air pollution and noise emissions (compare also the results of COST 321).
The basic motivation of the MOSCA scientific approach is the hypothesis that all organisations, institutions and citizen affected by urban traffic will benefit from sharing knowledge. Exploiting information only locally available yields some myopic profits, but on the long run, cooperative strategies pay off better.
MOSCA aims at improving several problems areas affecting freight distribution in European metropolitan areas, such as booking and reservation procedures, vehicle routing, loading/unloading areas reservations, emergency management support, effective and efficient inter-connection. The vision of the project is to provide a sophisticated technology that allows the actors involved to collaborate on urban freight distribution. Each local authority or company, influencing traffic by its decisions on traffic regulations, road maintenance and transport, is considered to be both a sender and a receiver of traffic-related information.
From the technological point of view, MOSCA is designed for future added value services with several modules (short path, tour planner, on-line routing, shop delivery planning) being implemented on this project. Core concept is based on state-of-the-art technologies with open interfaces to other services.
Objectives:
MOSCA provides a set of computer tools to assist the transport operators in planning their transport services. The approach integrates the urban goods flows and its related infrastructure within advanced off-line and on-line urban transport models allowing authorities to plan, assess and control freight policies according to their needs while private transport operators take advantage out of the model by accessing actual traffic and other information (e.g. 'works ahead' on roads or closed lanes).
Furthermore, MOSCA investigated the possibility to improve transport models by registering, integrating and considering planned transport flows or even planned single transports from private shippers and transport operators.
Technologically, MOSCA designed an information system as a platform for future add value services with several modules (shortest path, tour planner, on-line routing, shop restocking planning) being implemented in this project. Core concept is an application server based on state-of-the-art technologies with open interfaces to services.
Criteria are logistics service degrees on demand side and sustainability on supply side. Input of traffic related events and the corresponding inclusion in dynamic road network models for calculation of estimated arrival times are objectives of the supply-oriented system components. The demand-side inputs data on scheduled transports and on short-term modifications into the information system. This information results from logistics process planning steps for distribution and transport and affect downstream supply chain operations.
Key sub-objectives are:
- Stimulating optimal use of existing technologies
- Developing open system for additional modules
- Rising of high level of acceptance among key actors
- Enhancing user friendly interface
MOSCA strongly supports the concept that new technologies must answer customer's need, delivering benefit for the whole Community. MOSCA aims at exploiting project outputs supporting applications in existing and newly developed information systems.
Information system development was market-led from the very beginning involving both transport operators and relevant services providers across the project lifetime.
MOSCA tools found adaptation to the existing systems being a straightforward process, with user interfaces having been fine tuned to make it as intuitive as poss
Methodology:
The design of the MOSCA system has been performed starting with the user requirements identification of both supply and demand side. From the user requirements, a set of suitable applications has been selected. For these applications, necessary modules have been identified and developed. Once MOSCA tools have been implemented and tested, the results have been analysed and then evaluated.
Technical work has been organised according the following activities:
- Information system specification: based on user requirements, the technological specification was developed by decomposing the system into modules for communication, storage, application logic, and user interface designed in open standards (e.g. XML, CORBA, etc.) for communication.
- Supply-oriented system components: transport demand model for urban commercial transport that reflects the real traffic demand and allows an assignment together with passenger transport matrices and a sustainability assessment module which allow the assessment of noise related measures.
- Demand-oriented system components are basically implementations of innovative operations research algorithms. These algorithms are provided as dynamic libraries of code which will be possible to embed in end-user applications.
- Test-sites supported the local user requirements, assessment criteria together with information system performance and acceptance. The resulting MOSCA subsystem has been evaluated in the German, Swiss and Italian sites, at different degrees, according to existing situation and data availability.
- Evaluation of information system and test-sites is based on the results of the test sites and is focused on the technical approach, on user acceptance, and on performance in terms of logistics metrics and sustainability.
- Dissemination & Exploitation have been carried out in synergy with public authorities, industries and interested transport companies as well as the national follower groups and relevant EC research initiatives (e.g. Thematic Networks).
Share this page