Understanding and Planning for Freight Movement in Cities: Practices and Challenges

ABSTRACT

Planning for freight presents a perpetual challenge for governments. Understanding freight flows has attracted increasing research attention, though such knowledge can be difficult to translate to address problems in planning practice. This paper critically assesses the challenges of understanding and planning for urban freight movement, especially with reference to achieving more sustainable outcomes. In doing so, we elucidate guidance for broader analytical and policy approaches suited to meeting diverse public interest objectives. We review the literature with specific reference to the nature of policy problems, while collating existing conceptual knowledge for broad urban land use types.

KEYWORDS:

• Freight
• freight generation
• logistics
• trip generation
• planning

Acknowledgements

This research was partly supported by the Western Australian Planning and Transport Research Centre (PATREC). The authors would also like to thank both anonymous reviewers.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Planning and Transport Research Centre (PATREC) WA.