The objectives of this project are to develop and implement a technology solution to support research, development, and demonstration of data processing techniques, models, simulations, smart phone applications, and a visual-confirmation system to reduce parking seeking behavior, reduce parcel truck dwell time, and increase network and commercial firms’ efficiency by increasing curb occupancy rates.
Publication Features
Year Two Progress Report: Technology Integration to Gain Commercial Efficiency
Cargo E-Bike Delivery Pilot Test in Seattle
This study performed an empirical analysis to evaluate the implementation of a cargo e-bike delivery system pilot tested by the United Parcel Service, Inc. (UPS) in Seattle, Washington. During the pilot, a cargo e-bike with removable cargo container was used to perform last mile deliveries in downtown Seattle.
Improving Food Rescue in Seattle: What Can Be Learned from a Supply Chain View?
Seattle Public Utilities (SPU) engaged SCTL in foundational research into the logistics of food rescue in Seattle. This research forms part of SPU’s broader work to identify barriers to making food rescue operations in Seattle as effective and efficient as possible—and work toward solutions to overcome those barriers with both the private and public sector. This research includes interviews with a representative cross-section of food suppliers, food bank agencies, meal program providers and nonprofit partners.
Common MicroHub Research Project: Research Scan
This research scan revealed a lack of an established and widely accepted definition for the concept of consolidation centers or microhubs. Many recent implementations of urban freight consolidation have focused on bundling goods close to the delivery point by creating logistical platforms in the heart of urban areas. These have shared a key purpose: to avoid freight vehicles traveling into urban centers with partial loads.
Freight and Transit Lane Case Study
Research on the impacts of a freight and transit (FAT) lane implemented in January 2019 in Seattle. To improve freight mobility in the City of Seattle and realize the objectives included in the city’s Freight Master Plan (FMP), the FAT lane was
opened upon the closing of the Alaskan Way Viaduct. The objective of this study was therefore to evaluate the performance and utilization of the FAT lane. The results of the traffic volume analysis showed that transit vehicles chose the FAT lane over the general purpose lane at ratios of higher than 90 percent.
Inventory of Private Loading & Unloading Infrastructure
This report describes the work to map all private loading docks, loading bays and loading areas for commercial vehicles in Seattle’s First Hill and Capitol Hill and document their design and capacity features. Taken with the UFL’s private infrastructure inventory in Downtown Seattle, Uptown and South Lake Union, this report finalizes the creation of a comprehensive Greater Downtown inventory of private loading/unloading infrastructure.
Year One Progress Report: Technology Integration to Gain Commercial Efficiency
The objectives of this project are to develop and implement a technology solution to support research, development, and demonstration of data processing techniques, models, simulations, smart phone applications, and a visual-confirmation system to reduce parking seeking behavior, reduce parcel truck dwell time, and increase network and commercial firms’ efficiency by increasing curb occupancy rates.
Curb Allocation Change Project
Like many congested cities, Seattle is grappling with how best to manage increasing use of ride-hailing service by Transportation Network Companies (TNCs) like Uber and Lyft. According to a 2018 Seattle Times analysis, TNC ridership in the Seattle region has grown to more than five times the level it was in the beginning of 2015, providing, on average, more than 91,000 rides a day in 2018. And the newspaper reports Uber and Lyft trips are heavily concentrated in the city’s densest neighborhoods, where nearly 40,000 rides a day start in zip codes covering downtown, Belltown, Capitol Hill and South Lake Union.
Tracking Curb Use in Seattle
Vehicles of all kinds compete for parking space along the curb in Seattle’s Greater Downtown area. The Seattle Department of Transportation manages use of the curb through several types of curb designations that regulate who can park in a space and for how long. To gain an evidence-based understanding of the current use and operational capacity of the curb for commercial vehicles (CVs), SDOT commissioned the Urban Freight Lab to study and document curb parking in five selected Greater Downtown areas.
Seattle Center City Alley Infrastructure Inventory and Occupancy Study
The Supply Chain and Transportation Logistics Center conducted an alley inventory and truck load/unload occupancy study for the City of Seattle. Researchers identified locations and infrastructure characteristics of alleys within Seattle’s One Center City. The resulting database includes GIS coordinates for both ends of each alley, geometric and traffic attributes, and photos. Researchers observed activity in selected alleys to determine time vacant and occupied by trucks, vans, passenger vehicles, and cargo bikes. Researchers then developed alley management recommendations to promote safe, sustainable, and efficient goods delivery and pick-up.
Common Carrier Locker Pilot Test at Seattle Municipal Tower
This report provides compelling evidence of the effectiveness of a new urban goods delivery system strategy: common carrier locker systems that create parcel delivery density and provide secure delivery locations in public spaces. Common carrier locker systems are an innovative strategy because they may be used by any retailer, carrier and goods purchaser, and placed on public property. This contrasts to branded lockers such as those operated by Amazon, UPS and FedEx that are limited to one retailer’s or one carrier’s use. Common carrier lockers use existing smart locker technology to provide security and convenience to users.
Common Carrier Locker Systems: Phase I
The rapid expansion of e-commerce has flooded American cities with delivery trucks, just as those cities are experiencing booming population growth. Retailers need a more efficient, reliable, and cost-effective way to deliver goods in increasingly crowded urban environments. For their part, cities like Seattle want to minimize traffic congestion, both to sustain quality of life for residents and to ensure a smooth flow of goods and services.
The Final 50 Feet of the Urban Goods Delivery System
This report includes information on the first of many research tasks planned for the partnership between SDOT and the Urban Freight Lab. This is the first assessment in any U.S. city of the privately-owned and operated elements of the Final 50 Feet of goods delivery supply chains. These include private truck freight bays and loading docks, delivery policies and operations within buildings located in Center City.
Paper
Published:
Authors: Haena Kim, Dr. Anne Goodchild
2021
Dwell time is defined as the time that delivery workers spend performing out-of-vehicle activities while their vehicle is parked. Restricting vehicle dwell time is widely used to manage commercial vehicle parking behavior. However, there is insufficient data to help assess the effectiveness of these restrictions. This makes it difficult for policymakers to account for the complexity of commercial vehicle parking behavior.
Student Theses and Dissertations
Published:
Authors: Haena Kim
2021
This dissertation aims to provide insights and data-driven approaches to support freight plans in various cities around the globe with a focus on urban freight deliveries. To accomplish this goal, this dissertation first proposes to discover the current delivery process at the final 50 feet by creating value stream maps that summarize the flow of delivery activities and times, time variations between activities. The map will be based on the data collected from five freight-attracting buildings in downtown Seattle. Secondly, this research explores contributing factors associated with dwell time for commercial vehicles by building regression models. Dwell time, in this study, is defined as the time that delivery workers spend performing out-of-vehicle activities while their vehicle is parked. Finally, this dissertation predicts total time spent at the final 50 feet of delivery, including dwell times and parking-related times through discrete event simulations for various “what if” delivery scenarios.
Paper
Published:
Authors: Dr. Andisheh Ranjbari
2021
Mobility services including carsharing and transportation network company (TNC) services have been growing rapidly in North America and around the world. Measuring the effects of these services on traveler behavior is challenging because the results of any such analysis are sensitive to how (1) outcomes are measured and (2) counterfactuals are constructed.
Technical Report
Published:
Authors: Gabriela Girón-Valderrama, Dr. Anne Goodchild
2021
Seattle now ranks as the nation’s sixth-fastest growing city and is among the nation’s densest. As the city grows, so do truck volumes—volumes tied to economic growth for Seattle and the region as a whole. But many streets are already at capacity during peak hours and bottleneck conditions are worsening. This project is designed to deliver critical granular baseline data on commercial vehicle movement in two key areas of the
Paper
Published:
Authors: Dr. Giacomo Dalla Chiara, Fiete Krutein, Dr. Andisheh Ranjbari, Dr. Anne Goodchild
2021
As e-commerce and urban deliveries spike, cities grapple with managing urban freight more actively. To manage urban deliveries effectively, city planners and policy makers need to better understand driver behaviors and the challenges they experience in making deliveries. In this study, we collected data on commercial vehicle (CV) driver behaviors by performing ridealongs with various logistics carriers.
Paper
Published:
Authors: Dr. Ed McCormack
2020
Although road infrastructure has been designed to accommodate human drivers’ physiology and psychology for over a century, human error has always been the main cause of traffic accidents. Consequently, Advanced Driver Assistance Systems (ADAS) have been developed to mitigate human shortcomings. These automated functions are becoming more sophisticated allowing for Automated Driving Systems (ADS) to drive under an increasing number of road conditions.
Paper
Published:
Authors: Dr. Giacomo Dalla Chiara
2020
Urban deliveries are traditionally carried out with vans or trucks. These vehicles tend to face parking difficulties in dense urban areas, leading to traffic congestion. Smaller and nimbler vehicles by design, such as cargo-cycles, struggle to compete in distance range and carrying capacity. However, a system of cargo-cycles complemented with strategically located cargo-storing hubs can overcome some limitations of the cargo-cycles.
Paper
Published:
Authors: Dr. Giacomo Dalla Chiara
2020
Despite significant advances in freight transport modeling in recent years, there is still lack of available tools for evaluating novel logistics solutions. We introduce the framework of SimMobility Freight, which is part of SimMobility, a multi-scale agent-based urban transportation simulation platform. SimMobility Freight is capable of simulating commodity contracts, logistics and vehicle operation planning and parking decisions in a fully-disaggregate manner.
Technical Report
Published:
Authors: Dr. Ed McCormack, Dr. Anne Goodchild, Manali Sheth
2020
This report presents research to improve the understanding of curb space and delivery needs in urban areas. Observations of delivery operations to determine vehicle type, loading actions, door locations, and accessories used were conducted. Once common practices had been identified, then simulated loading activities were measured to quantify different types of loading space requirements around commercial vehicles.
Paper
Published:
Authors: Dr. Anne Goodchild, Dr. Giacomo Dalla Chiara
2020
Parking cruising is a well-known phenomenon in passenger transportation, and a significant source of congestion and pollution in urban areas. While urban commercial vehicles are known to travel longer distances and to stop more frequently than passenger vehicles, little is known about their parking cruising behavior, nor how parking infrastructure affect such behavior.