City Logistics

177

12

Access Restrictions and Local

Authorities’ City Logistics

Regulation in Urban Areas

Hans J. Quak

Contents

12.1 Introduction 178

12.2 An Overview of Access Restrictions 182

12.2.1 Time Access Restrictions 183

12.2.2 Vehicle Restrictions 187

12.2.3 Low Emission Zones/ Environmental Zones (Engine

Restrictions) 188

12.2.4 Vehicle Load Factor Controls 189

12.2.5 Road Pricing/ Congestion Charging 191

12.2.6 Parking and Unloading Restrictions 192

12.3 Logistical Implications of Restrictions 193

12.4 Regulating and Restrictions as Part of an Urban Freight

Transport Solution 196

12.5 Concluding Remarks 197

References 198

CITY LOGISTICS: MAPPING THE FUTURE

178

12.1 INTRODUCTION

Urban freight operations are usually recognized for their unsustainable

impacts on the environment. Even though the modern urbanized civiliza-

tion requires an efcient urban freight transport system in order to sus-

tain both the demands for goods and services as well as to remove waste,

counteracting the negative impacts of the system takes most of the efforts

of local authorities. Urban freight operations have negative impacts on all

sustainability indicators in several ways:

• People: consequences of accidents with large vehicles and vulner-

able road users, as in cities these groups share the infrastructure,

nuisance (noise), and the consequences of local emissions for

public health.

• Prot: logistics inefciencies due to last- mile issues and local reg-

ulations, but also contributing to urban congestion.

• Planet: adding to CO

2

emissions.

One of the difculties in city logistics is that many different actors with

different (and sometimes even conicting) interests are involved as well as

with a different geographical scope and viewpoints. This makes it a chal-

lenge to actually come up with sustainable solutions for all stakeholders.

Van Rooijen and Quak (2013, 505), for example, mention, “compared to

the other thematic clusters of CIVITAS, the urban freight logistics cluster

has not reached the results that was hoped for. A large part of the mea-

sures in this cluster is not continued after the project or not completely

implemented at all during the project. The main reason for that is that

for freight transport the participation of private companies is needed

because these measures take place in a competitive market.” This conclu-

sion highlights one of the problems in city logistics: even though local

authorities and residents are the most affected by the sustainability prob-

lems in cities (e.g., emissions and nuisance, both local and global), solu-

tions to improve sustainability often lie within the scope of inuence

and action of private companies (especially carriers). The most important

stakeholder groups and their interests, relationships, and objectives are

(see also Figure12.1):

• Local authorities: their scope is local (i.e., the city or even a smaller

area). The main issues are air quality, trafc safety, city accessibil-

ity, and congestion.

• Carriers: a very heterogeneous group—and with that a hetero-

geneous scope as well—containing private carriers and for-hire

LOCAL AUTHORITIES’ CITY LOGISTICS REGULATION IN URBAN AREAS

179

carriers, (small) local carriers as well as global express services.

Their interest is in organizing transport operations as efciently

as possible and, in doing so, carriers often consider local regula-

tions in various cities as a major barrier together with receiver

demands and typical city issues such as congestion and difcult

maneuverability in small streets (see also Quak, 2012).

• Residents: their scope is very local (sometimes as narrow as their

own street); most often residents do not want nuisance (noise,

visual, vibration, and smell) from urban freight transport.

• Shippers: quite often shippers do not consider themselves as hav-

ing an interest in urban freight transport. However, shippers are

often responsible for hiring (or actually operating in the case of

private carriers as part of a chain of stores) transport operations

and form, therefore, the stakeholder group that determines many

of the actual urban freight transport characteristics. Therefore,

shippers are a group that is necessary to involve in nding solu-

tions for the issues mentioned. The shippers’ scope is usually not

local but wider (regional, national, or international).

• Receivers: their scope is local; these stakeholders are actually

the group responsible for urban freight transport operations by

ordering products in the rst place. Their interest is therefore the

Information ow and direction

Goods ow and direction

Local

authorities

Higher

government

CASE 1

Carrier

for

-

hire carrier

Receiver

small (medium)

sized business

Shipper

Local

authorities

Higher

government

CASE 2

Carrier

private carrier

Receiver

part of retail chain

Shipper

retailer

’

s

headquarters

Figure 12.1 Heterogeneity in relationships between stakeholders. A large retail

chain and a small sized business (Quak, 2008).