Workforce Development Resources

Workforce summit will discuss and look into the needs in the transportation field for workers, researchers, and educators for now and for the future years to come.

This paper proposes and applies a micro-simulation model for the modeling of urban freight transportation that describes freight transportation at the behavioral level. The proposed model is a modification of the traditional four-step approach considering the behavior of each freight decision maker individually. The model structure consists of three stages: commodity production and consumption, commodity distribution, and conversion of commodity flow to vehicle movement. The proposed model has been applied to estimate truck movement in the Tokyo Metropolitan Area for model validation. This paper discusses the issues involved in model development and validation including conceptual framework, mathematical formulation, and estimated results.

Around the world, interest in urban and metropolitan goods movements is increasing since they account for a substantial share of traffic in urban/metropolitan areas. In this context, many city administrators have implemented measures to mitigate the negative effects of freight transport. Starting from an analysis of existing studies relative to freight policies implemented at urban scale, this paper proposes a general classification of measures adopted at an urban scale and an empirical analysis of obtainable results.

Over the last decade, research in the area of urban freight transport has increased and local authorities are slowly beginning to acknowledge the need to consider freight in their overall transport planning. Most urban freight studies to date consider specific solutions and measures, as opposed to ways in which the local authorities could and should consider this issue in the wider transport planning and decision making process. The aim of this paper is to examine cities that differ in context in order to demonstrate that urban freight transport planning can be improved by involving a wider range of stakeholders. Interview data from Sweden, the UK and the Baltic Sea Region has been analyzed to draw out the factors that influence the perceptions of local authorities and freight operators of freight transport issues in urban areas. The findings show that the issues faced by the freight industry are still not fully understood. The paper contradicts earlier research results that suggest differences in the ways that local authorities consider freight transport, and goes some way towards demonstrating that the problems faced by local authorities are not unique to one country or any specific category of urban area, and hence a generic decision-making framework would be of value. A framework is developed to facilitate meaningful interaction between the various urban freight actors and stakeholders.

This paper proposes a modeling system developed in order to analyze the urban freight transport and logistics within urban and metropolitan areas. A review of models developed to simulate this segment of mobility is also reported. The review analysis highlights the limits of models for the ex-ante assessment of city logistics measures. For this reason this paper proposes a new modeling system approach for the assessment of city logistics measures. It is made of different steps approaching problems related to: quantity OD (Origin-Destination) flows, restocking type OD flows, delivery OD flows, delivery OD flows for time slice and vehicle type, and vehicle OD flows. This modeling system has been specified and calibrated using some surveys carried out in the inner area of Rome where more than 500 truck drivers and more than 600 retailers have been interviewed.

This project links a newly developed method for estimating intra-metropolitan freight
flows with a widely used transportation planning software to demonstrate its feasibility
for sketch level regional transportation planning. We link the Argos planner, an
automated computational workflow, with the TransCAD transportation planning
software. The Argos planner was originally developed and tested with 2001 data for the
Los Angeles Region; we updated to 2007 data. The updated model results were
compared against the baseline model for the region. The linked system was used to test
three different policy scenarios: reduction in international trade, shift of freight from
truck to rail, and truck peak period pricing. The scenario results are plausible and
demonstrate the utility of the model for sketch level planning. A user-friendly graphical
interface was developed to allow easy use of Argos by practitioners. The linked model
would require additional development to be useful in professional practice. The
updating process is complex and requires expertise in both freight dynamics and
regional economic modeling. The modeling approach is unconventional, so would
require extensive training and technical assistance for use in public planning agencies.

Ports open their doors for educators to bring their students to the Ports to see the role LA Ports play in Southern California. Teaches 12 lessons related to Maritime and world of trade themes.

This paper discusses a methodology to increase the consistency with which urban good innovations and projects are evaluated. The methodology has been developed in France and is based on a detailed examination of 15 projects comparing the wide range of criteria used in their evaluation. Following the discussion of the methodology and a summary of how it was devised the paper goes on to show its application to two projects, one in France involving mail and small package deliveries and the other in the UK involving an urban consolidation centre for retailers. Using the two case studies demonstrates the application of the methodology and also shows some of the challenges in terms of data acquisition. The paper concludes by considering the value of the approach and outlining further research needs.

This paper presents the results obtained of a methodology that was implemented for the feasibility analysis, both technical and economic, of freight distribution systems in urban and/or metropolitan areas using railways. This includes a system of urban freight demand models. The scope of this research is to assess a competitive rail transport option with respect to road truck transport for some specific types of goods. The first part of the paper presents a state-of-the-art system focusing on international and national experiences of the use of railway infrastructures for urban freight distribution and describes the general framework of freight demand models for urban and metropolitan areas. The latter part of the paper proposes a modeling system to estimate the freight demand to be used within the methodology for the technical and economic feasibility analysis of freight distribution systems using railways infrastructures. Finally, results of an application to a real test case are reported. The authors refer to the study case of the Sorrentina peninsula, which is one of the most famous tourist areas near Naples and well-known for its low accessibility by roads.

We study the problem of determining the number of vehicles needed to provide a demand responsive transit service with a predetermined quality for the user in terms of waiting time at the stops and maximum allowed detour. We propose a probabilistic model that requires only the knowledge of the distribution of the demand over the service area and the quality of the service in terms of time windows associated of pickup and delivery nodes. This methodology can be much more effective and straightforward compared to a simulation approach whenever detailed data on demand patterns are not available. Computational results under a fairly broad range of test problems show that our model can provide an estimation of the required size of the fleet in several different scenarios.

The paper reports a modelling system to simulate goods movements at an urban scale. It allows joint analysis of choices made by end-consumers (assumed to be families) and retailers. These movements are examined at two levels: analysis of commodity flows, in terms of quantity, generated by the consumption of commodities; analysis of commodity flows, in terms of vehicles, due to restocking. The first level allows us to calculate the goods quantity flows due to consumption and restocking; the second level allows us to determine the service, vehicles used and target time, as well as the route chosen for restocking sales outlets in order to estimate vehicle flows on the urban/metropolitan transportation network. The modelling system is a multi-step model and considers a disaggregated approach for each decisional level.

The Barge Terminal Tilburg (BTT) is located in the city of Tilburg. Currently, this container terminal is operating near full capacity. Since terminal expansion is not possible, an option for the construction of a new terminal is being prepared. The problem is defined as follows: to determine the best design of the new barge terminal that offers high operational performance without exceeding the environmental standards of urban scenery. The research strives to find a balance between the operational issues and the environmental effects of the designs of the new terminal and to evaluate them on performances and noise emission.

In this paper we present a new insertion-based construction heuristic to solve the multivehicle pickup and delivery problem with time windows. The new heuristic does not only consider the classical incremental distance measure in the insertion evaluation criteria but also the cost of reducing the time window slack due to the insertion. We also present a non-standard measure, Crossing Length Percentage, in the insertion evaluation criteria to quantify the visual attractiveness of the solution. We compared our heuristic with a sequential and a parallel insertion heuristic on different benchmarking problems, and the computational results show that the proposed heuristic performs better with respect to both the standard and non-standard measures.

In this paper we present a parallel regret insertion heuristic to solve a dial-a-ride problem with time windows. A new route initialization procedure is implemented, that keeps into account both the spatial and the temporal aspects of the problem, and a regret insertion is then performed to serve the remaining requests. The considered operating scenario is representative of a large-scale dial-a-ride program in Los Angeles County. The proposed algorithm was tested on data sets of 500 and 1000 requests built from data of paratransit service in this area. The computational results show the effectiveness of this approach in terms of trading-off solution quality and computational times. The latter measure being especially important in large-scale systems where numerous daily requests need to be processed.

This paper presents some calibration developments of a system of models for the simulation of freight restocking journeys within urban areas. The model system allows us to define freight vehicle Origin-Destination (O-D) matrices. The journeys for restocking urban retail activities are modelled through the definition of the trip-chain order and the choice of the delivery location. The modelling system has been calibrated and validated on a dataset of more than 500 truck driver interviews carried out in the city centre of Rome.

The Connecticut Department of Transportation created a High-Def image inventory of the state's entire roadway network, accessible for desktop computer viewing by users throughout the agency. The photolog director traces the development and capabilities of the pioneering system, which has saved the state approximately $2 million.

Even though logistics consolidation concepts and strategies had been early introduced, inactive policy means and insufficient business models have hindered the actual development and fulfillment of effective logistics consolidation in Korea. This study suggests revitalization strategy for the already-built logistics consolidation centers, private-public collaboration program, and various role business models by benchmarking several Japanese and European cases as well as by conducting actual condition survey in Korea. It stresses the role of government in promoting the use of logistics consolidation centers, building and enhancing the partnership between public and private sectors, and developing feasible projects. Another main outcome of this study is the master plan of logistics consolidation projects in Korea.

This study introduces more comprehensive and integrated approach to city logistics issues in the Seoul Metropolitan Area (SMA), which emphasizes the balance between passenger and freight transportations, urban freight-specific logistics infrastructures and services, and last-mile delivery problems. It examines the major issues and characteristics of urban freight movements in the SMA and diagnoses the existing city logistics policies and institutions so that it ultimately suggests the revised master plan of logistics infrastructure development along with more effective and concrete action plans.

Freight transport has a minor role in transport planning procedures in most cities, although freight transport operations represent a substantial proportion of emissions. The focus in this research is the local authority perspective of sustainable urban freight transport and the aim is to contribute to the understanding of how freight transport affects the urban environment and how awareness and knowledge within the local authority effects the urban freight transport situation. The analysis is based on four studies: a literature study, a review of transport in three cities via in-depth interviews, a review of freight in four cities via in depth interviews and finally a review of freight in all Swedish cities via a questionnaire survey. Three aspects are considered throughout the research: the sustainability concept, knowledge and awareness as well as barriers and drivers. The results confirm that knowledge and awareness in the area of urban freight transport is low, which generates a low level of interest in the subject and makes it hard to predict outcomes of certain actions. The implication for local authorities is that the issue of urban freight transport should gain a higher priority on the agenda.

The paper proposes a modelling system for simulating freight tours within urban and metropolitan areas using the tour-based approach. In particular, the proposed model allows us to define vehicle Origin-Destination (O-D) matrices satisfying a given delivery O-D matrices by modelling the definition of the trip-chain order and the choice of the delivery location. The modelling system has been calibrated and validated on the basis of more than 500 truck driver interviews carried out in the city centre of Rome