TITLE: Improving Freight System Performance in Metropolitan Areas –Summary of NCFRP Report 33 (http://www.trb.org/Publications/Blurbs/172487.aspx)

ABSTRACT: This presentation will provide an overview of the findings the recently-published NCFRP Report 33, Improving Freight System Performance in Metropolitan Areas. Freight transportation movements in metropolitan areas, particularly urban or downtown settings, has become a major topic of research in recent years. Due to the production and especially demand needs of many businesses, a significant volume of freight movements occur throughout metropolitan areas. These movements provide many benefits, primarily in the forms of supporting businesses through freight pickups and deliveries, and through providing numerous jobs. However, freight movements also create many challenges in the same areas, primarily in the forms of traffic conflicts with other motor vehicles, bicyclists, pedestrians, and other transportation system users, and through increased tailpipe emissions that negatively impact air quality. Finding ways to promote freight transportation’s benefits while minimizing its negative impacts is a challenge in all metropolitan areas, and made more difficult by the fact many different attributes impacting freight transportation movements, such as roadway infrastructure, vehicle operations, business pickup and delivery time windows, and zoning regulations, are controlled by different public agencies and/or private businesses. To improve freight system performance in metropolitan areas, all the different stakeholders that influence freight transportation movement trends need to be engaged in the comprehensive planning and assessment process.