Control and Enforcement in Urban Freight Transport
The greater an area or system is, the more it makes sense to carry out checks and controls with support of electronic equipment. Often national regulations limit the use of video enforcement to control urban freight transport. States regulate this use in different ways. When observations and detections are allowed, the data must be deleted after a certain time period.
The lack of availability of human resources for regularly monitoring and enforcement, and failure factors associated with manual control and enforcement systems can be overcome by using electronic control technologies like camera detection. However, revenue from the fines and penalties imposed as part of the enforcement process can be used to pay for the electronic enforcement equipment.
City access restriction schemes
The legal framework for city access charges is still not regulated in some countries. Furthermore, the introduction of any road user charge in some cases requires a revision of the constitution and/or other legislation. Access restrictions for freight vehicles are currently strongly linked with time windows and limitation of weight and size. This approach is very pragmatic and its success is due to the fact that it is easy to implement it (it only needs road signs and an appropriate enforcement).
In recent years, innovations, new concepts and trials have been introduced in the field of environment related schemes and access charging schemes. More specifically, 'low emission zones' (LEZ) or 'environmental zones' have been successfully implemented in Swedish cities (Stockholm, Gothenburg, Malmö and Lund). Unlike other schemes LEZ are mainly driven with the intent to reduce air pollution and noise, and can be based on a geographical area, a time period, vehicle emission standards, vehicle types, or loading factor / utilisation rate. Low-emission vehicles are fostered by discounts in road pricing schemes and tax reductions.
The London congestion charging concept is an example of very successful scheme (minus 18 % of overall traffic and minus 30 % of delays without any shift of congested roads, a broadly neutral impact on overall business performance in the zone). Operators may profit from increased reliability of deliveries due to less delays, more efficient vehicle and driver usage, more reliable tour planning, faster, more flexible deliveries. Such a scheme is not for freight traffic only and has a much broader impact on economy, society and environment than other, freight specific restrictions. However, today's legislation does not allow such schemes everywhere.
Regulations on vehicle size and weight have further found adoption even in smaller cities, leading to an enhanced use of small delivery vehicles. Time windows were adapted to businesses' needs, whereas night deliveries still are very controversial (some cities ban trucks at night because of noise emissions, others take advantage of the decrease in traffic load at daytime and an increase in transport efficiency followed with night deliveries). In terms of improved cooperation between operators and authorities, in the Netherlands, a national committee for an increased cooperation of urban freight parties was set up. First results of this initiative are a harmonisation of time-windows among a number of cities and the consideration of businesses needs in urban freight concepts.
Besides the restrictive schemes, there are also other successful initiatives like the advisory schemes, such as the lorry guiding network in Bremen (Germany) or the information given to road users via signs and map.