Minutes BESTFACT Best Practice Factory for Freight Transport

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1 Project Meeting Minutes BESTFACT Best Practice Factory for Freight Transport BESTFACT Urban Freight Workshop: Public and Private Partnerships for Zero Emission Urban Freight in Europe Date 6 th and 7 th of December 2012 Venue Brussels Info Place, Rue Royale 2-4, 1000 Brussels Compiled by EIA Speakers Day 1: Fleur Breuillin, DG MOVE (EC) Marcel Huschebeck, PTV Group Sylvain Haon, POLIS Nicolas Etienne, Ecopostale Bruno de Lille, Bruxelles Region Ian Wainwright, Transport for London Julius Menge, Berlin Senate Jacques Leonardi, University of Westminster Lode Messemaker, City of Rotterdam Chair: Michael Browne, University of Westminster Day 2: Carlo Vaghi, Interporto Padova Julien Gouvis, Geodis Juergen Zajicek, AIT Francesco Massa, IVECO Mark Major, DG MOVE Julius Menge, Berlin Senate Ian Wainwright, TfL Christophe de Voghel, City of Brussels Lode Messemaker, City of Rotterdam Sergio Barbarino, P&G Chair: Michael Browne, University of Westminster Day 1: 6 th December 2012 Cluster 1 Urban Freight Summary The workshop had a good attendance of around 70 participants. Fleur Breuillin from DG-MOVE first gave an overview of current European actions and policies on Urban Freight. Project Leader PTV and workshop organiser POLIS introduced the BESTFACT project s activities in Cluster 1. The objective that was achieved on the first day was to present the newly developed Brussels Region freight plan and to discuss about similar freight plans, solutions and initiatives in London, Rotterdam and Berlin. Further, the BESTFACT activities and results obtained in Cluster 1 Urban Freight were summarised and the company Ecopostale presented its successful business model using bikes for urban deliveries. Main issues emerging from this first day of the workshop were the lack of coordination, limited data availability, and poor media attention. 1. Introduction by Michael Browne, University of Westminster Mr. Browne welcomed the participants and gave a short introduction to the topic and the speakers. He pointed out the need to improve partnership and cooperation among all relevant stakeholders and Page 1 of 7

2 called upon suggestions and contributions from the public. 2. Overview by Fleur Breuillin, DG MOVE Fleur Breuillin gave an overview of the Commission policies and activities about Urban Freight. DG MOVE has identified inefficiencies in Urban Freight Logistics and consequently developed new policy objectives. These include the improvement of ICT, the deployment of potential inland waterways, a shift towards night deliveries, a revamping of intermodal transfer facilities. To achieve these goals, a greater cooperation among all relevant actors is required. Mrs Breuillin then cited some of the past relevant initiatives issued by the Commission in the field of Urban Transports, including the Civitas Initiative, the Covenant of Mayors, the 2009 Action Plan Urban Mobility. Future developments are to be expected from the Initiative 33 A strategy for near zero emission logistics by 2030, from the Horizon 2020 initiative, and from the launch of the High Level Group on Logistics. 3. Marcel Huschebeck, PTV Group Marcel Huschebeck introduced the BESTFACT project to the workshop, its purpose of contributing to a more successful transfer of sustainable solution, its structure around three Clusters topics covering a broad range of logistics activities, preliminary achievements and further expected outcomes. He thanked the City of Brussels for hosting the meeting. Contact: info@bestfact.net 4. Sylvain Haon, POLIS Silvain Haon presented the interest of local authorities in exchanging with experts on sustainable urban freight solutions, and the importance of Urban Freight as a strategic topic for POLIS activities. Condition of success in knowledge transfer for Polis were that we don t forget any of the components of the system, that having all the relevant stakeholders on board is vital to address transport and logistics challenges, and that coordination and building up of trust are key requirements, along with efficient planning and good communication. 5. Keynote speech: Nicolas Etienne, Ecopostale: Clean vehicles deliveries in Brussels Ecopostale is the first Belgian zero-emissions postal service. Launched in 2010, it features a green fleet of bikes, cyclocargos and electric vans. It s specialised in urban logistics, especially last mile-first mile, and has carried out deliveries since its foundation, avoiding 30 tons of CO 2 emissions. Responding to some questions from the public, Mr Etienne explained that after 2 years, Ecopostale has a competitive advantage in the city centre (no restrictions for bikes) without any added cost for the customer. The service includes any kind of small size delivery (packages, parcels, mails, diplomatic documents) apart from pallets and it is based at one distribution centre. Contact: nicolas.etienne@ecopostale.be 6. Keynote speech: Bruno de Lille, Brussels Secretary of State for Mobility: Brussels urban freight plan Bruno de Lille presented the newly developed urban freight plan for the Brussels Region. Smarter supply in the Brussels Region is a strategy aimed at having less trucks, less pollution in the last mile delivery. The Brussels Government and its partners have created a system of round tables for a coordinated planning of 5 strategic and operative areas of action: - Structure for urban distribution - Town planning - Operational measures towards more efficient deliveries - Data, research and innovation - Coordination role of the region. The region is developing an ambitious plan that includes mapping of current freight flows, definition of the tasks for all relevant players, launching of pilot projects such as LaMiLo, which will create a Local Distribution Centre called TIR centrum for the last mile deliveries and the conversion from mixed logistics long distance operations to urban distribution. The role of the region in this multi-stakeholder Page 2 of 7

3 strategy is coordinating the efforts and disseminating the results with an awareness campaign. It is noticeable that in Brussels all the companies with more than 100 employees have to perform an analysis of their transport demand. 7. Keynote speech: Ian Wainwright, Transport for London: London Freight - learning the Olympic Lessons The case of London is an example of how urban freight planning can bring benefits and avoid major disruptions in the network. Confronted with the challenge of the upcoming Olympics 2012, the local government studied how to prevent the worst case scenario of a collapsing of urban mobility. Before the Olympics, 88% of London Freight used to move on road (17% of traffic is freight), and mainly during the day (from 6 to 18). The program was aimed at ensuring that deliveries service did not fail (no food in the shops would have damaged UK s reputation), without interfering with the Games transfers of athletes and officials within the city. A freight forum was created to gather all relevant stakeholders around the same table. The main challenge was providing them with a simple procedure for rerouting and retiming trips when necessary, mainly thanks to the identification of key corridors. A code of practice has been developed as well. Communication also played an important role, notably on shifting deliveries out of hours to avoid peak times in morning and evening traffic. The model was successful as the average daily peak activity was dropped by 10% and shifted to the night, without causing delays in the delivery. Urban freight in London mastered the challenge represented by the Olympics, but new challenges are ahead. With a 12% population increase expected for the next 20 years, London should make sure that the partnership and coordination with the industry sector continues. Public-private communication, retiming of deliveries, improvement of routings are key challenges for city governments dealing with urban traffic developments. Contact: ianwainwright@tfl.gov.org 8. Keynote speech: Julius Menge, Berlin Senate: Berlin Urban Freight day initiative Julius Menge started his intervention by pointing out the issue of the lack of awareness and understanding of the importance of freight in urban environment. Media reports on urban freight are almost not existing. How can local authorities inform citizens? Complaints about noise and accidents caused by trucks are an issue. Local authorities often strive to explain why urban freight is vital and how they are reducing its negative impact on the city, but the message rarely gets through. This is clear in Berlin, where a new project which helped reduce the impact of industry shipping on urban traffic was almost ignored by the media: the project designed by Siemens consisted of a new ship which manages to load the huge Siemens turbines directly from the factory, thus avoiding a longer trip on wheels through the city s streets. Communication and media recognition are open issues which call upon joint strategies and new ideas. The City of Berlin suggests to institutionalize an European Urban Freight Day, with the purpose of increasing visibility of the numerous local best practices which are striving to reach the public. A model could be the Tag der Logistik des Bundesvereinigung Logistik in Germany (= day of logistics, organized by the German logistics association) on April 19, 2012 involving many logistics venues in Germany. Contact: julius.menge@senstadt.berlin.de 9. Jacques Leonardi, University of Westminster: Inventory of BESTFACT Best Practice cases in Urban Freight; Status, Potential and transfer options Jacques Leonardi explained how best cases are selected for the BESTFACT project in Cluster 1 Urban Freight. The relation of costs and benefits, efficiency, level of innovation, transferability and scalability, impacts and benefits and data availability are key indicators of a best case description. For cluster one (urban freight), 15 cases have been inventoried so far (compare slides). Some of these will be presented in detail during the session of the following day. Looking through the collected cases, the slight dominance of consolidation and/or clean vehicles solutions was visible. Some doubts could arise when considering the transferability on a larger scale of the best practice. It has also proved difficult to have access to data on the situation before the implementation of the practice. Page 3 of 7

4 Replying to a question by Mark Major (DG MOVE), Jacques Leonardi said that shippers and final customers are the most difficult stakeholders to have on board when searching for best cases. Mark Major also asked about the possibility of ranking best practices. BESTFACT does not intend to rank the 15 selected cases, but these cases represent the best among a selection of 92 proposed solutions. Contact: j.leonardi@westminster.ac.uk 10. Lode Messemaker, City of Rotterdam: Rotterdam s zero emission strategy for city logistics To implement an innovative solution such as electric freight or low emission technology in urban area, it is necessary and important to set policy goals by leaving some open choice to the local stakeholders and key players. At the same time it is important to share the knowledge about mistakes, and not only about best practices. One mistake could be focusing too much on means rather than on goals. The electric vehicles case is quite enlightening: difficulty in the availability of vehicles or of power supply station, high costs and problematic public procurement. City of Rotterdam s current approach is facilitating the infrastructure instead of vehicles. Setting standards and let private companies come up with R&D solutions. Focusing on wider targets and remaining flexible is also a logical consequence of the current tender legislation. In the Netherlands, large procurements legislation makes it hard to promote small pilot projects with new type of vehicles. Interesting initiatives in Rotterdam regard the promotion of electric vehicles and the possibility of renting charging stations. Rotterdam is also adopting restrictive measures, such as an environmental zone for trucks. The problem related to this kind of restrictions is the fact that they are different from city to city, which raises concerns about investors being likely to run away from cities with the strictest legislation. An effort towards coordination is needed, in order to improve better logistics efficiency, notably with harmonized time windows. What could the EU do? Set standard and general goals to be addressed with different means according to the local context. Contact: l.messemaker@rotterdam.nl 11. Claudia Eichhorn / Marcel Huschebeck, PTV Group: Development of new zero emission cities PTV Group worked on a large urban development project in Russia which intends to create the Skolkovo innovation centre. The centre will follow the 4E strategy, meeting certain ergonomics, energy, economy and ecology requirements, notably in its transport infrastructure and planning. Skolkovo will be a small town nearby Moscow hosting inhabitants and employees. 70% of them will reach the centre, or move within it, by using public transport. PTV has developed two possible scenarios for managing freight logistics in the area, one based on strict access restrictions and strong intermodal nature, the other based on softer restrictions and more focus on compensation measures. Skolkovo will host an innovative logistic hub. Strategic needs for the project to succeed are a strong political will, a clear organization of urban freight and services (with a shift away from private cars even for passenger transportation), and a strong marketing campaign. Mark Major (DG MOVE) noted that developing a city logistics from scratch is a valuable exercise for European companies, considering the many similar opportunities which are to be found in developing countries. Contact: claudia.eichhorn@ptvgroup.com Day 2: 7 th December 2012 Cluster 1 Urban Freight Summary The second day of the cluster workshop offered some other valuable cases of green urban logistics, and an insight on IVECO strategy for clean and adaptable vehicles. The second part of the day hosted an interactive session aimed at fostering a debate on inputs for the new EU urban action plan. The panellists asked the Commission to set guidelines and foster communication, stakeholder connectivity and data availability. Awareness of citizens, persuasion of Page 4 of 7

5 national governments and involvement of private stakeholders emerged as key goals on which the Commission could play an important supportive role. The Commission, rather than setting limitative standards, should provide governments and cities with guidelines and general goals. 1. Carlo Vaghi, Gruppo Clas: Cityporto Padova Cityporto is an urban distribution centre (UDC) based operational service for delivery of goods in urban area through the use of Hybrid or compressed natural gas (CNG) vehicles. It has contributed since it foundation to reduce pollution levels in Padova. Cityporto started its activity in 2004 following an agreement among public stakeholders. Its success comes from different factors: support from the municipality, a clear industrial plan, participation on voluntary basis, closeness to the urban area, gradual steps, reliability and neutrality of the platform manager. Now, 55 operators share Cityporto facilities and services. Gruppo Clas has conducted an analysis on behalf of Padova Interporto for the years The study highlights a reduction of 1216 km per day thanks to Cityporto service. The number of deliveries remains significantly high despite the crisis, and the number of parcels per delivery has increased as well. Cityporto is financially self-supporting since Being an in-house public company, they do not have costs for the rent of the infrastructure. In Italian legislation, there is a lack of harmonization in transport legislation, therefore every city develops its own restrictions and time windows - limited access to city centres is becoming an issue for many companies. It should be noticed that the companies working in Cityporto are acting independently, therefore no Cityporto label appears on the parcels or on the receipts and each company has its own tracking and tracing system. 2. Julien Gouvis, Geodis: Distripolis in Paris Julien Gouvis presented the Distripolis Project, launched in Paris in 2011 by Geodis. Distripolis is a private run organisational scheme for the use of electric vehicles in city logistics, developed in cooperation with local stakeholders. Distripolis is a new concept on the logistics of transporting goods in cities that integrates the objectives of sustainable development by commanding every link in the multimodal supply chain, from the first kilometre to the last. The development of grouped flows towards cities, by train, barge or full trucks, and final-kilometre logistics that are as gentle as possible on residents and communities. Distripolis has started its functions in five French pilot cities but other pilot cases are forseen in cities abroad (Italy, Belgium, UK). Before Distripolis, everyone had to use his own assets space to perform deliveries inside the city. Distripolis main targets: developing a fleet of 75 electric vehicles and 56 tricycles, being able to perform 5500 deliveries a day or 125 t a day. The objective is to reach the 95% of last mile deliveries with electric vehicles (in 2012 the share is about 8%). Existing barriers are: the frequent changes in regulation; the scarce availability of logistics basis in other cities, the lack of interoperability among IT systems. Distripolis facilities are located underground in order not to avoid visual or acoustical disruptions. 3. Jurgen Zajicek, AIT, iladezonen in Vienna iladezonen is a project which aims at solving the problem of traffic congestion and waste of time related to loading and unloading areas in Vienna. The project time frame goes from 10/2011 to 03/2013. The consortium is made mainly by small companies. In Vienna, actually the number of loading zones is not known. Sometimes private vehicles are illegally occupying loading zones in front of big retailers and supermarkets, causing traffic congestion. Bad planning of the last mile delivery causes a 300 minute per month time loss per truck. Moreover, the loading zones are not included as Points of Interest in GPS. iladezone intends to use available, cheap and reliable technology to allow trucks to know if a certain loading zone is currently free or not. The project will have positive impacts on the activity of retailers, transport companies and on public transportation in the city. Monitoring the loading zones with cameras will also contribute to law enforcement for illegal parking. Loading zones remain an open issue for urban freight, both for their management and legal status (reservation of a public space). Barcelona and Bilbao multi-use lanes are another BESTFACT good practice (presented the day before by Leonardi). Still some problems need to be solved as who is going to operate the system when it will be implemented on a larger scale and the impossibility to get a Page 5 of 7

6 permission to install a video-camera on the loading zone without a public authority order. The iladezone should help the truck driver to decide whether to wait or to change his delivery plan if a loading zone is signaled as occupied. The distance between a loading zone and the place of delivery is on average 10 m. Contact: juergen.zajicek@ait.ac.at 4. Francesco Massa, IVECO: IVECO s clean vehicles developments Mr. Massa illustrated IVECO s strategy towards urban mobility evolution. One basic goal of IVECO is coming up with a vehicle that has a low cost of ownership. On the other hand, the strategy has to take into account the spreading of different traffic restrictions in towns. One paramount necessity is that of sharing costs of technology changes, therefore infrastructure managers, the industries and the public authorities have to be involved. For IVECO there is not a predominant clean solution. Along with the continuous improvement of diesel engines, IVECO strongly invests in CNG (= compressed natural gas) (for medium distance journeys) and electric vehicles (for short distance journeys). Methane is efficient, less noisy and eco-friendly. Interesting vehicles are the Daily (electric), Eurocargo (hybrid), the CITELIS hybrid bus (diesel-electric) and the DUAL ENERGY, which will allow users to select traction (either electric or hybrid) according to their needs. IVECO calls upon measures such as promotion of Bio-methane and biogas, optimisation of city logistics, development of international hubs. An open issue is the involvement of fuel distributors, which are not here today. Mark Major noted that the EU is developing a strategy for transport fuel requiring every State to say what they are doing to promote alternative fuels. 5. Panel discussion: What can the EC do to reduce CO2 in urban freight? Mark Major from DG MOVE pointed out the two goals focused on urban areas from the White Paper: near zero emission city logistics by 2030; and greener urban vehicles by By Spring 2013 the European Commission will release three initiatives on sustainability plans, road charges, zero CO2 in city logistics. Currently hearings are taking place along with an open consultation on-line. The EC will organise a workshop on these issues. It should be underlined that urban freight appears to be a deeply sensitive issue for the EC since it is too political. From the questionnaires gathered by the EC four stances have emerged: city logistics is neglected by the EU; any process for improving city logistics should be well structured; harmonisation is not fully accepted, any measure has to be economically sustainable. Sergio Barbarino (Procter & Gamble) stated that when tackling this issue we have to consider also people habits. Vans or trucks may circulate half empty, but so do many private cars. According to P&G studies the highest share of CO2 along the supply chain is produced by customers going to shop with their own car. Lode Messemaker stressed the importance of cooperation. It could also be possible to start a competition among cities for the best success in cleaning urban logistics. The EC could issue a directive on urban logistics similar to the one on clean vehicles. According to Christophe de Voghel, the European Commission s main task should be to raise awareness of the public. As far as external costs are concerned, the EC should be more consistent in its policies and underline the fact that in urban environment the external costs are higher. Julius Menge on his side called upon a framework of objectives which leaves cities free to find their own means to get there. Ian Wainwright noted that city logistics is part of global supply chains but this fact is not widely recognised by the public. A major issue is represented by the fact that the urban transport has been for long time managed detached by the land use policy: this is becoming now impossible. A solution would be to influence politicians that sustainable solutions are increasing the efficiency for business. One question from the public suggested that the EC could set a rule by which all delivery vehicles weighing more than 8 tons should be zero CO2 emission. Barbarino wonders what is the need of a zero emission vehicle if it runs empty. There should be no empty vehicles. De Voghel warned about the possible competition between city and suburbs. Mark Major replied that EC cannot do much as the Page 6 of 7

7 main interlocutors are transport ministers, not cities. The EC thinks that asking cities to find solutions without taking into consideration their limited budget would not be realistic. In order to better coordinate the governance in the multilevel system, Julius Menge reaffirmed his idea of the EU being too high-level for urban planning, also taking into consideration the diverging domestic legislations. He then pointed out the existing cooperation between Berlin and Brandenburg or between Baden-Württemberg and Switzerland. For Ian Wainwright, the EC should provide local actors with a range of existing and feasible solutions and instructions on how to apply them to the local scenarios. Mark Major agreed on the role of the EC being mainly about fostering innovation by setting general goals, rather than directly applicable measures. At the time being each State has its own target for CO2 emission and it is free to decide how to reach it. A question was raised about indicators: could we consider broader indicators to be divided in subindicators (CO2, number of trips, economy...)? Sergio Barbarino cited the Supergreen Project using 6 performance indicators (aside with 2 emission indicators, these are cost effectiveness, reliability, frequency and punctuality) as a model. The economic indicator is fundamental to know who is paying for it. Julius Menge and Christophe de Voghel admitted that lack of comparable indicators and data is one of the major problems. Indicators belong to the R&D area, so it s hard for the Commission to find solutions on that. Mark Major anticipated that the EC might develop a Basic Urban Emissions Scoreboard. One further suggestion from the floor was to create a European Portal for trucks logistics. Mark Major replied that countries should run their own portals, a European-level solution not being logical for this issue. The priority is facilitating communication between locally-ran management systems. A final question was asked about the possibility to marketing sustainable urban freight. In this sense Wainwright stated that communication is a vital issue, since companies have to power to increase awareness and revamp freight image and perception. De Voghel acknowledged the fact that the final customer is the actor that has the main power to accept and start the change. Mark Major closed the debate informing that the hearing phase at the EC will continue for one month. A major commitment will be to show how sustainable measures are improving efficiency on the economic side. Michael Browne noted that the question of awareness (both in citizens and stakeholders) emerged as a key issue from the debate although we are still lacking of viable solutions. Marcel Huschebeck thanked the organisers of the workshop, the panellists and the moderator, reminded about the next BESTFACT events and contact details and officially closed the workshop. Page 7 of 7