Tag «urban consolidation center»

The retailer’s perspective on the potential for using urban consolidation centers (UCCs)

A new paper examines the role of supportive policies and value-added services that may incentivize retailers to use an urban consolidation center (UCC). The methodology is a case study of Edinburgh, Scotland, based on semi-structured interviews with 30 retailers. Results show that retailers are generally not positive towards using UCCs, and the services that they …

Urban Consolidation Centres: from the perspective of suppliers

An Urban Consolidation Centre (UCC) can decrease the number of freight vehicles and their mileage in urban areas. In practice, however, UCCs often rely on subsidies and seldom make it past their starting period. Understanding how UCCs affect urban freight transport is mostly based on mathematical models and on the opinions of stakeholders who do …

Research: the environmental impact and costs of externalities of using urban consolidation centres

Literature on city logistics presents a large number of practical experiences of urban consolidation centres (UCCs). Still, there is limited knowledge about the potential reduction of the environmental impact and the related externality costs (vehicle kilometres, the number of vehicles, CO2 , NOx  and PM). A new paper by Katsela et al. evaluates the environmental …

London research: how can delivery management systems support construction logistics?

The use of delivery management systems (DMS) for construction logistics in London has grown considerably in recent years, and are now viewed as essential tools to address an increasingly complex and regulated construction environment. The emergence of DMS, therefore, is closely linked with this evolving compliance landscape. Research by Transport for London provided valuable insights …

Investigating the financial viability of urban consolidation centre projects

Urban consolidation centres (UCCs) are a popular measure in city logistics. However, many UCCs strongly rely on government subsidies and are granted a short life because of their inability to reach financial sustainability. Despite the interest from both the practitioners and the research community, there are a limited number of quantitative contributions that investigate the …

Paris ‘front door to logistics’

With construction having started in the spring, the Paris multimodal logistics centre will be opening its doors soon. Fleet Street reports about it: We used to think that they were unwelcome in town centres, driven once and for all into more or less distant suburbs: however, logistics facilities are making their come back in the very …

Urban freight: hub or no hub?

Countless books and articles have been written about urban distribution centers, logistics decoupling points, city hubs and urban consolidation centers. Every self-respecting European city has been the scene of such initiatives – the one more successful than the other, but all highly subsidized in any case. What can we learn from those initiatives? The best …