Overview
Urban freight represents typically between 20 and 25% of road space contributing to between 10 and 20% of urban road traffic. This is indispensable for a city's economy, but at same time significantly affects the attractiveness and quality of urban life.
The project was designed from a complementary perspective for work that is promoted at the EU level by addressing urban logistics from a wider (geographical) perspective, focusing upon a worldwide level (in general) and on Brazil and Peru (in particular).
The project aimed to extend, expand and transfer existing knowledge to other countries and thus effectively contribute for the overall objective of extending the research and knowledge dissemination between EU and Latin America. The project therefore acted as a coordination platform and knowledge centre in urban logistics practices and solutions that exist mondially. The objectives can be described as follows:
- provide an international network of experts and a platform for the exchange of ideas, information and policies on the urban logistics field. Promote cooperation among relevant international networks on urban logistics;
- select nine case studies as base for potential transferability: two cases in Europe, three in Latin America and one for the other regions, China, Japan, India and Africa;
- compare different business concepts and models based in the selected case studies;
- organise four thematic workshops coupled with site visits (two workshops in EU and two in Latin America);
- develop transferability guidelines targeting each type of stakeholder to facilitate the transferring of international case studies to national context.
The core mission of TURBLOG-WW and its role in EU research can be summarised as follows: (i)gather urban logistics experiences, (ii) analyse these carefully, (iii) extract and disseminate valuable information, (iv) support initiatives and (v) transferability to Latin America countries.
Act as a coordination platform, gathering the experience to: identify, generate and assess best practice solutions on urban freight initiatives, through the conduction of a set of case studies. These cases studies were undertaken to identify best practices and to assess the lasting effects and impacts of previous projects and/or tools, and to compare experiences. And also to promote workshops and site visits, exchange of information, raise awareness, disseminate and assess the potential to transfer research results at national, European and intercontinental levels.
At the TURBOLOG-WW platform people can expand and transfer knowledge on urban logistics. To join, people can/must register on the website and become a 'virtual partner': this allows to participate in the forum, download special contents, take part in workshops, share experiences and get information on innovative solutions.
The project is organised along the following main lines:
- network coordination;
- case studies;
- business concepts and models;
- transferability;
- urban logistic guidelines;
- thematic workshops and;
- dissemination activities.
Funding
Results
The process which was made to suit the specific needs of TURBLOG-WW could also be useful for other research projects with a similar focus upon generic transferability issues (not necessarily restricted to urban freight).
Innovation aspects
One of the attractive features of the developed transferability process is that it is highly city-specific. Rather than attempting to identify generalised measures that 'will work everywhere', the process focuses upon the particular features of the location to which the measure is being transferred, under the implicit assumption that each location is different.
Whilst this feature of the process is admirable for real world transport policy making, it clearly presents a challenge for making generalised conclusions about policy and technical measures for facilitating urban freight movement.
Policy implications
The measures that are most likely to be adopted are those related to regulation. Indeed, these measures demand fewer financial resources and the cultural resistance is usually lower because, in general, the cities have already a tradition in implementing regulatory measures.
The crisis in urban mobility with increased congestion and space restrictions for carrying out loading and unloading operations, can contribute to accelerate the process of establishment, development and implementation of measures that improve the freight distribution in cities.
Other results
The project has proposed suggestions for applying the methodology in cities of Latin America. A general problem in cities of Latin America is the informality in urban logistics transactions and the excessive number of autonomous carriers. Therefore it is necessary to be creative in breaking down that barrier and to involving these informal stakeholders in the ex-ante assessment.
Furthermore, it is important to develop strategies to raise awareness among carriers and traders about urban logistic, including knowledge experiences of success around the world.
Policy objectives
• The external dimension
• Modern infrastructure and smart funding: Transport infrastructure (territorial cohesion and econmic growth)