Research Projects

Summary:
This project brings together researchers from Portland State University and the Urban Freight Lab to develop new methods for estimating e-commerce-related vehicle miles traveled (VMT) in the Seattle and Portland regions. The research combines household e-commerce demand data, detailed inventories of logistics facilities and delivery touchpoints, and real-world delivery routing data to better understand how online shopping affects urban freight activity. The project will develop and test new approaches for modeling e-commerce demand, delivery routing, and freight VMT, while comparing results generated using national datasets with those derived from richer regional data sources. The resulting tools and datasets will help planners and policymakers better understand the transportation, environmental, and infrastructure impacts of e-commerce growth.

Summary:
This research aims to develop innovative methods for managing curb lane function and curb access. The rapid rise of autonomous vehicles (AV), on-demand transportation, and e-commerce goods deliveries, as well as increased cycling rates and transit use, is increasing demand for curb space resulting in competition between modes, failed goods deliveries, roadway and curbside congestion, and illegal parking.

Summary:
The Urban Freight in 2030 project explores emerging trends shaping urban freight and their implications for sustainable development. Drawing on the expertise of Urban Freight Lab members, partners, researchers, and subject matter experts, the project develops a shared vision for the future of urban delivery. The resulting vision documents outline key opportunities, challenges, and strategic priorities for urban freight systems through 2030.

Summary:
This study will use a driving simulator to design a simulation experiment to test the behavior of commercial vehicle drivers under various parking and delivery situations and to analyze their reactions. The ability to modify the simulator’s environment will allow the researchers to relatively easily test a range of scenarios that correspond to different delivery and parking situations, such as changing road characteristics (land use, number of travel lanes, nearby signals, traffic in adjacent lanes), curb allocations (paid parking, commercial vehicle loading zones, passenger load zones), and other road users (passenger cars, ridehailing vehicles, bikes). In addition to monitoring behavior and decision-making, the simulator can also monitor distraction (through eye tracking) and the stress level of drivers (through galvanic skin response) when making these decisions and interacting with other road users. Analyzing parking decisions and driver stress levels based on roadway and driver characteristics will provide insights on travel behaviors and the parking decision-making process of commercial vehicle drivers, and will help city planners improve street designs and curb management policies to accommodate safe and efficient operations in a shared urban roadway environment. This study is intended to fill knowledge gaps and serve as a valuable resource for policy makers, transportation engineers, and urban planners.

Summary:
The City of Seattle granted a permit to United Parcel Service, Inc. (UPS) in fall 2018 to pilot test a new e-bike parcel delivery system in the Pioneer Square/Belltown area for one year. The Seattle Department of Transportation (SDOT) commissioned the Urban Freight Lab (UFL) to quantify and document the public impacts of this multimodal delivery system change in the final 50 feet of supply chains, to provide data and evidence for development of future urban freight policies. The UFL will conduct analyses into the several research questions.

Summary:
This project seeks to examine how microfreight hubs can increase equity to services, benefit historically marginalized communities, and be joined to share micromobility options, social service agencies and minority businesses in North Fort Smith, Arkansas. The Urban Freight Lab will assist Frontier MPO and the City of Fort Smith in this work create a cohesive strategy to develop a sound planning process, to grow collaborative relationships, to produce a sustainable business model, and to implement a microfreight hub pilot project that leverages community resources.

Summary:
The UFL will lead research initiatives within the Open Mobility Foundation’s SMART Curb Collaborative, contribute academic content and presentations to the group, and work closely with Cityfi and the Collaborative to support joint deliverables. The UFL will focus on three main thematic areas of inquiry to inform comparative learnings and insights across the Collaborative: curb infrastructure, curb policy, and curb demand.

Summary:
Seattle is part of C40’s Zero Emission Area Programme, which aims to restrict fossil fuel vehicles in designated zones to reduce emissions and test zero-emission policies. This project examines the impacts on urban freight and logistics, including EV adoption challenges and emerging strategies such as e-cargo bikes, curb management, and consolidation approaches.

Summary:
To better understand the current use of truck parking facilities and safety issues caused by the lack of parking capacity in high-demand locations, researchers reviewed existing research and reports that describe the lack of parking in the PacTrans region. The researchers then identified and provided a qualitative analysis of future trends that will affect this problem. Finally, the research team developed and executed a survey of truck drivers at two long-haul trucking parking facilities. The research team focused on two high-volume multi-state truck corridors, the Interstate 5 and 90 corridors, that are of interest to the Washington State Department of Transportation (WSDOT) and neighboring state DOTs. This study presents the data collection method, the overall survey results, and an analysis of the findings.

Summary:
This project studies delivery drivers’ walking and parking behavior in urban logistics, where much of last-mile delivery happens outside the vehicle. A collaboration between the Urban Freight Lab and KTH Royal Institute of Technology, the goal is to model these behaviors and evaluate solutions like e-carts and improved parking strategies to support more efficient and sustainable urban delivery.

Summary:
The purpose of this research is to improve our understanding of the interactions between heavy vehicles and other users in an urban environment, in particular, in cases where commercial vehicle activity disrupts the activity of pedestrians and bicyclists. The research approach includes both the observation of current practice and evaluation of infrastructure and simulation of roadway user behavior. This information will support better roadway and load zone design guidelines, which will allow our urban street system to operate more efficiently, safely, and reliably for all users.

Summary:
The Urban Freight Lab leads the technical research and policy work for the City Climate Innovation Challenge, developing tools and strategies to help U.S. cities implement and scale zero-emissions delivery solutions.

Summary:
The purpose of the research project was to test two promising strategies to reduce the number of failed first delivery attempts in urban buildings: (1) A common carrier smart locker system; and (2) grouped-tenant-floor-drop-off-points for medium sized parcels if the locker is too small or full. The pilot was held in the 62-story Seattle Municipal Tower skyscraper in Downtown Seattle and was open to the first 100 tenants who signed up to participate. 

Summary:
The Supply Chain Transportation & Logistics Center was funded by the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials (ASHTO) through the National Cooperative Highway Research Program (NCHRP) to produce the nation's first Multimodal Freight Transportation Research Roadmap outlining themes and projects that comprise a 5- to 10-year strategic research agenda.

Summary:
The Urban Freight Lab will implement wireless sensors in neighborhood micro-pantries to monitor inventory, expiration dates, and local demand and supply patterns, aiming to optimize food distribution and safe storage.