Urban logistics is changing rapidly with new vehicles, emerging flash drivers and stricter legislation for cleaner mobility. At the same time, the physical city is developing much more slowly, leading to tensions between space and use. This begs the question: what will urban logistics look like in 20 years? In collaboration with the Stimuleringsfonds Creatieve Industrie, the Municipality of Rotterdam and TNO, we investigated future scenarios for city logistics. Download the study.
The research focuses on the spatial impact of urban logistics, current trends and implications for the future. By mapping these scenarios, we aim to offer insight into how the city can prepare for tomorrow's logistics challenges so that we can anticipate a sustainable and efficient urban environment now.
More or less space for urban logistics?
Urban logistics forms the metabolism of the city: delivering and collecting goods, raw materials and services is a vital function for the urban metabolism. This function requires space: for traffic and infrastructure, and for transshipment and businesses. The densification of the city necessitates minimizing environmental impact, but also increasing the efficiency of space use. At the same time, the demand for more logistics is growing. Like other urban functions, logistics will therefore have to be accommodated, stacked and shared with other functions.
The Old West in Rotterdam as a case study
In this research we focus on the spatial impact of logistics in the inner-city context: this is where logistics land take increasingly comes into conflict with other functions. For this we use the Oude Westen district of Rotterdam as a case location. This focus on the existing urban environment allows us to explore the possibilities for integrating urban logistics within the boundary conditions of the existing city. This focus on the existing urban environment allows us to explore the possibilities for the integration of urban logistics within the boundary conditions of the existing city.
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A Catalog of Urban Logistics
To get a handle on the complexity of the logistics ecosystem, we distinguish between three building blocks that collectively make up this ecosystem: 1. Traffic, 2. Infrastructure, 3. Hubs. In addition, we have depicted the main typologies for each building block: together these form a catalog of urban logistics.
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Future scenarios for urban logistics
We use scenarios to depict how urban logistics might develop in the future, based on extrapolation of current trends. In our design research, we look at four specific scenarios arising from two axes that focus on distinctive developments in the logistics and social/urban domain. The vertical axis looks at the logistics domain and distinguishes between an integrated and segregated logistics system, while the horizontal axis looks at the social/urban planning domain, distinguishing between city-centric urbanism and logistics-centric urbanism.
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Conclusions scenario study
The scenario study charts the relationship between logistics systems and spatial planning of the city. With the further densification of the city, the availability of goods and services increasingly come into conflict with the livability of the city: not everything can be everywhere at the same time. By cleverly integrating different logistics services and making logistics hubs as accessible as possible, the number of vehicle movements can be reduced and city streets can remain vital.
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