Seeking equity and justice in urban freight: where to look?

Figures & data

Table 1. Linking prevailing mobile justice theories to missing questions in urban freight research.

	Foundational concepts	Implications for transport	Examples of missing RQs in urban freight
Transportation Justice (TJ)	Distributive spheres Modified, liberal egalitarianism (Rawls’s difference principle, sufficientarianism) Capabilities Approach (CA)	Accessibility is an important human capability to freely participate in society. Fair transport institutions prioritise programmes that provide enough accessibility for the worst-off.	RQ1: How do researchers identify equitable distributions of urban freight’s benefits (and costs)?
Mobility Justice (MJ)	Multi-scalarity Recognition and representation Mobility commons/commoning	TJ over-simplifies its own political contradictions. Mobility injustices are multi-scalar and informed by unequal political power. Deliberate attention must be given to scalar inequities and whose knowledge and participation is privileged in decision-making.	RQ2: At what scale do researchers evaluate urban freight inequities?
			RQ3: Who does research consider entitled to urban freight equity and how are they involved in urban freight governance?

Table 2. Classification table summary of sampled urban freight literature (N = 34).

	Distribution (RQ1)		Scale (RQ2)		Involvement (RQ3)
Studies	Cost/good	Principle	Space/time	Commodity chain	Entitled	Participant
Choi et al., 2021 (modelled different scenarios); de Oliveira et al., 2019; Keeling et al., 2021; Luo et al., 2022; Schaefer & Figliozzi, 2021	Accessibility	Modified egalitarianism	CDP-based accessibility	Online-ordered goods	All online consumers, with some emphasis on populations excluded from digital and physical services.	Free market at top, government regulation at bottom.
Berkowitz et al., 2018; Breitbarth et al., 2021; Cholat & Daconto, 2021; Figliozzi & Unnikrishnan, 2021; Sanchez-Diaz et al., 2021	“	“	Home-based accessibility	“	“	“
Demetillo et al., 2021; Houston et al., 2008; Karner et al., 2009; Lee et al., 2009; Ryan, 2017; Schweitzer, 2006; Yuan & Wang, 2021	Air pollution, traffic crashes, hazmat spills	Simple and modified egalitarianism	Proximity to logistics infrastructure and activity	Heavy trucks transporting globally traded commodity	Marginalised populations residing near logistics infrastructure	Municipal and regional regulatory authorities
Garcia et al., 2013; Hricko et al., 2014; Matsuoka et al., 2011; Schneller et al., 2022	Air pollution	Representation, community driven participatory research (CDPR)	Proximity to logistics infrastructure and activity	“	“	Municipal and regional regulatory authorities, environmental advocates, and university partners
De Lara, 2018; Nogue-Alguero, 2020	Air pollution, labour precarity	De-growth, multi-scalar political ecology	Critical history perspective of port proximity	“	Marginalised populations residing near ports, dock and truck workers	Waterfront commoning, authorities wedding environmental and labour justice
Bates et al., 2021; Bates & Friday, 2018; da Costa Lage & Rodrigues, 2021; Lopez et al., 2019; Lord et al., 2022; Vecchio et al., 2022	Labour precarity induced by gig economy	Contested sustainability, recognitional justice, “data justice”	Non-spatial ethnographies of worker experiences	“Crowd logistics”	Delivery couriers, including those of marginalised status	Regulatory and union intervention into labour marketplace
Coetzer & Pascarel, 2014; Das et al., 2021; Navarro et al., 2021	Delivery and ordering efficiency for low-income retailers	Implicit Libertarianism	Delivery efficiency for low income retailers in Global South cities	Consumable retailer goods shipped conventionally, crowd logistics, or pick-up	Low-income consumers or retailers	Retailers/carriers, socially responsible enterprises, some government programmes
Buldeo Rai et al., 2017; Garus et al., 2022	“Triple Bottom Line”	NA	Non-spatial evaluation of last-mile delivery modes	Online-ordered goods	Buldeo Rai et al. (2017) do not specify; Garus et al. (2022) suggest digitally excluded consumers	Delivery providers, regulatory authorities

Note: Colour refers to distributive sphere: blue = accessibility, yellow = labour stability, red = safe and healthy environment; green = other.

Figure 1. Publishing year and total number of studies by distributive sphere.

de Oliveira, L., Oliveira, R., de Sousa, L., Caliari, I., & Nascimento, C. (2019). Analysis of accessibility from collection and delivery points: Towards the sustainability of the e-commerce delivery. URBE. Revista Brasileira de Gestão Urbana, 11. https://doi.org/10.1590/2175-3369.011.e20190048

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Schweitzer, L. (2006). Environmental justice and hazmat transport: A spatial analysis in southern California. Transportation Research Part D: Transport and Environment, 11(6), 408–421. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.trd.2006.08.003

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Yuan, Q., & Wang, J. (2021). Goods movement, road safety, and spatial inequity: Evaluating freight-related crashes in low-income or minority neighborhoods. Journal of Transport Geography, 96, 103186. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jtrangeo.2021.103186

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Matsuoka, M., Hricko, A., Gottlieb, R., & DeLara, J. (2011). Global trade impacts: Addressing the health, social and environmental consequences of moving international freight through our communities.

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