Journal of Transport Geography 22 (2012) 129–136

Contents lists available at SciVerse ScienceDirect

Journal of Transport Geography

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/jtrangeo

Challenges in urban freight transport planning – a review in the Baltic Sea Region
Maria Lindholm ⇑, Sönke Behrends 1
Chalmers University of Technology, Division for Logistics and Transportation, 41296 Gothenburg, Sweden

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Keywords: Freight transport in urban areas is still not well understood and there is no methodology aimed at the
Case study analysis and planning of such areas. To achieve urban sustainability, new models for the management
City logistics of urban freight movements are needed, in which local authorities play a pro-active role. The aim of this
Integrated planning paper is to contribute to lay the groundwork for designing strategies to overcome the challenges involved
Urban freight transport
in sustainable urban freight transport. This paper is based on a multiple-case study analysing the current
Sustainable transport
Transport planning
state of urban freight transport and current planning practices in cities around the Baltic Sea. While the
cities differ in size, economy, and political and cultural frameworks, the transport sector plays a strong
role in all cities. In-depth freight interviews with public and private stakeholders were conducted and
complemented with several holistic interview sessions and document analysis. Potentials and shortcom-
ings in urban freight transport planning are presented and the results show that freight transport is
increasingly important for regional competitiveness while freight traffic is a growing threat for urban sus-
tainability. In turn, the urban context is a barrier for efficient freight operations. However, both local
authorities and transport operators neglect the problems that arise from freight in urban areas. An overall
awareness is needed to understand that a deeper integration of freight transport and urban sustainability
strategies can be beneficial for both the efficiency of freight transport networks and for local sustainabil-
ity. City authorities need more logistics competence to facilitate the required integration between private
and public actors.
Ó 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction shippers and final customers and as a result, a decreasing share

As cities are dominant centres of production and consumption,
most transport, both passenger and freight, starts and ends in ur-
ban areas and often bypasses several urban areas on its way. Urban
activities are accompanied by large movements of freight charac-
terised by delivery trucks moving between industries, distribution
centres, warehouses and retail activities as well as to and from ma-
jor gateways such as ports, rail terminals, distribution centres and
airports (Rodrigue et al., 2006). For cities seeking to compete in the
globalised economy, effective freight transport services are a key
success factor (Docherty, 2004). Transport hubs often confer bene-
fits on the region in which they are located. Because of their direct
connection to many destinations, they are ideal accessible places at
which to distribute material and hence are usually a catalyst for
agglomeration and scale economies (O’Kelly, 1998). Hence, urban
freight transport is an important facilitator of economic growth.
However, due to globalisation and transport network centralisa-
tion, the hubs increasingly serve distant and dispersed carriers,
⇑ Corresponding author. Tel.: +46 31 7721325.
E-mail addresses: maria.lindholm@chalmers.se (M. Lindholm), behrends@chalmers.se
(S. Behrends).
1
Tel.: +46 31 7721323.
of the hubs’ benefits is materialised locally. A consequence of the
transport system dynamics, which are often global in scope, is that
the hubs have lost much of their direct relationship with local
stakeholders (Hall, 2007). At the same time, it is the locality of
these hubs and gateways that suffer from their extensive land
use and traffic externalities. Congestion as well as air and noise
pollution are getting worse year by year. Furthermore, one in three
fatal accidents now occurs in urban areas (European Commission,
2007). The significance of urban freight on these unsustainable im-
pacts compared to passenger transport is growing. Though freight
transport operations in cities represent only 20–30% of road traffic,
it accounts for 16–50% of the emission of air pollutants (depending
on the pollutant considered) by transport activities in a city
(Dablanc, 2007). These challenges are generally common to all
European cities even though they are different in terms of
geographical, historical and cultural circumstances.
However, relatively little attention has been paid to urban
freight by researchers and policy makers despite its economic sig-
nificance and the local environmental problems associated with it.
The majority of studies conducted on sustainable urban transport
focus on passenger transport. A widely recognised prerequisite
for reaching sustainable urban transport is integrated transport
planning, but freight is rarely explicitly discussed as a part of this

0966-6923/$ - see front matter Ó 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.jtrangeo.2012.01.001
130 M. Lindholm, S. Behrends / Journal of Transport Geography 22 (2012) 129–136
integration. This situation is changing as big cities, e.g., London and
Paris are paying more attention to freight transport as part of their
overall transport strategies (Browne et al., 2007). Furthermore, the
European Commission highlights the importance of integrated
solutions involving stakeholders, citizens and other planning
departments in their Green Paper towards a new culture for urban
mobility (European Commission, 2007) and strongly recommends
authorities develop and implement Sustainable Urban Transport
Plans (SUTPs). However, the large majority of cities have not yet
found adequate solutions to help optimise the urban movement
of goods (Dablanc, 2007). Freight transport issues at the city level
are still not well understood and there is no widespread methodol-
ogy specifically aimed at the analysis and planning of freight
movements.
The purpose of this paper is twofold: first, to analyse the current
state of freight transport in urban areas; and second, to identify
possible shortcomings of current urban freight transport planning
practices. This paper aims to help lay the groundwork for designing
strategies and solutions to overcome the challenges involved in
securing the mobility of goods and reducing unsustainable impacts
from freight transport.
The rest of the paper is organised as follows. Section 2 provides
a literature review on urban freight transport and integrating plan-
ning. Based on the review a framework on integrated urban freight
transport is presented. In Section 3, we describe our research
methodology. Section 4 presents the empirical results. The frame-
work developed in Section 2 structures our analysis. Section 5 dis-
cusses the implications of the research. Finally, conclusions and
possibilities for future research are presented in Section 6.
2. Theoretical framework
2.1. Significance and complexity of urban freight transport
Cities are the drivers of the European economy since 85% of the
EU’s gross domestic product (GDP) is created in urban areas (Euro-
pean Commission, 2007). Cities face global competition for indus-
trial establishments that create the foundation for regional welfare.
Since regions with high levels of accessibility to raw materials and
markets tend to be more competitive than peripheral regions (Gut-
iérrez et al., 2009), transport infrastructure increasing the accessi-
bility is one critical success factor for regional development
(Lakshmanan, 2011; Nijkamp and Abreu, 2009). In turn, the avail-
ability of transportation co-determines location decisions of eco-
nomic facilities, which leads to changes in the land-use system
(Geurs and van Wee, 2004). Owing to the increased competition
between regions, all major freight hubs are currently committed
to expanding their infrastructure, which, however, is increasingly
becoming restricted due to land constraints and congestion in ur-
ban areas (Hesse and Rodrigue, 2004). Efficient urban transport is
therefore essential to the smooth functioning of transport net-
works, which in turn are significantly important for the economy
as well as for meeting the needs of the citizens.
At the same time, urban freight transport is increasingly becom-
ing a disturbing factor for quality of life, as urban areas now consti-
tute the living environment of over 70% of the population
(European Commission, 2009). In the year 2000, the externalities
from transport (excluding congestion) were estimated to account
for 7.3% of total GDP in EU15 plus Norway and Switzerland (IN-
FRAS/IWW, 2004). Freight transport is responsible for one third
of the external costs (excluding congestion) and road freight trans-
port is by far the dominating mode. The unsustainable impacts of
transport are numerous and multifaceted. Some impacts can be
limited to a local scale and are palpable only at the locality where
the traffic takes place (e.g., noise), while other impacts affect larger
regions over a longer period of time (e.g., greenhouse gas emis-
sions). The scale of the local impacts is co-determined by the pop-
ulation density of the locality where the traffic takes place. Hence,
it is in urban areas where the unsustainable impacts of freight
transport are most severe (CE Delft, 2008). Moreover, the associ-
ated costs of congestion in the EU accounted for 1% of GDP in
2006 (European Commission, 2006) and are the largest component
within many urban areas (European Commission, 2007).
However, freight movements are neither isolated activities nor
do they end at city borders. Furthermore, urban freight transport
is influenced by national and European legislation as well as techno-
logical development. Moreover, cities differ in geographical condi-
tions or in political and cultural values. Hence, both external
factors and local preconditions can influence the urban freight
transport system. According to May et al. (2006), the external fac-
tors, which can be both a barrier or driver for urban freight transport
planning, can be grouped into four main categories: (1) legal and
institutional factors; (2) financial factors; (3) political and cultural
factors; (4) practical and technological factors. To attain a sustain-
able transport situation in the urban area, all of these factors need
to be looked into and considered. Handling this complexity requires
integrated transport planning that includes both passenger and
freight transport as well as local planning departments.
2.2. Integrated transport planning
In order to reach attractive urban areas, transport planning
needs to be integrated with land-use planning as well as be in-
cluded in the strategic planning towards city visions (Banister,
2002). Furthermore, Banister (2002) concludes that apart from sin-
gle transport measures, there is a need for coordination between
passenger and freight transport. However, municipal transport
planning and sustainable development focus on passenger trans-
port rather than on freight transport issues. Results from a survey
sent to cities in the Best Urban Freight Solutions (BESTUFSs) pro-
ject show that half of the responding cities had no responsible
authority for freight transport issues (Zunder and Ibáñez, 2004).
Local authorities consider freight a private industry, since freight
transport in the urban areas is poorly understood and there is a
lack of systematic methodology for planning such activities (Crai-
nic et al., 2004). A combination of company initiatives and public
policies are necessary to develop a sustainable urban freight trans-
port system (Anderson et al., 2005). Bertolini et al. (2005) show
that there are very complex interrelations between the different
stakeholders and politicians in the policy making process. Further-
more, local transport authorities are hindered in their work by
‘short-termism’ in political decision making as well as contradic-
tions within policy objectives (Hull, 2005).
Integrated transport planning is therefore a concept widely
used and recognised today for reaching sustainable development,
but the concept is not easy to understand (Bertolini et al., 2005;
May and Roberts, 1995; Potter and Skinner, 2000). May et al.
(2006) distinguish between three different forms of integration:
(1) operational integration, usually of public transport; (2) strate-
gic integration between transport policy and land use; and, (3)
institutional integration within local, regional and national govern-
ments. Hull (2008) suggests that there are new approaches to plan-
ning practices and that there are well-known tools and
instruments to approach inter-sectorial work practices between
transport planners and those in other professions, but that these
tools are rarely used. Successful partnerships require engagement,
priorities and agendas shared by all public-sector actors as well as
key stakeholders. To attain a sustainable city, active citizen sup-
port, new forms of communication between citizens and experts
and involvement of all major stakeholders are needed (Banister,
2008). There must be a willingness to change, and an active
 M. Lindholm, S. Behrends / Journal of Transport Geography 22 (2012) 129–136
involvement of all actors is the most effective way to achieve a
change.
A more integrated approach than any previously used has lately
been encouraged by the European Commission in several strategies
for transport planning. The Green Paper towards a new culture for
urban mobility (European Commission, 2007) highlights the
importance of integrated solutions involving stakeholders, citizens
and other planning departments and recommends the implemen-
tation of Sustainable Urban Transport Plans (SUTPs). The SUTP is
an integrated approach with the goal of overcoming deficits in
the coordination and cooperation across administrative borders
(city and surroundings, agglomerations across regional/national
borders), as well as between authorities in national hierarchies (lo-
cal, regional, national governments). Concerning urban freight
transport, core planning principles of the SUTP are (Wolfram,
2004):
 The existence of an urban freight transport strategy, which
should be embedded in an overall sustainable development
strategy with a long-term perspective (ca. 20–30 years).
 Regional scope, defining the whole ‘‘urban agglomeration’’ as
the transport planning area and defining responsibilities to
ensure full commitment and to put liabilities into place.
 Stakeholder consultation, to secure maximum transparency
throughout the process and to improve the quality, accep-
tance, effectiveness and legitimacy of the actions.
 Actor cooperation and policy coordination, to ensure integra-
tion between all transport modes and policy sectors, as well
as geographical coverage of the entire functional urban
agglomeration.
 Capacity building, in order to ensure that key personnel have
the necessary skills.
2.3. Framework for sustainable urban freight transport
To better understand the complexity of transport between
logistics, transportation, infrastructure and land-use, Sjöstedt
(1996) presents a system-oriented conceptual model, which is
the basis for our framework. We extended the model to include:
(1) the external factors which influence the urban freight transport
system; (2) the SUTP concept and its planning principles as inte-
grating elements; and (3) the unsustainable impacts as an outcome
of external factors and urban freight transport planning and mea-
sures (Fig. 1).
The framework is based on four basic elements: facilities where
the economic activities take place, goods that demand transport to
and from these facilities, vehicles that provide transport services,
and infrastructure. These elements interact in pairs in four different
subsystems, which are: accessibility, land use, transport and traffic.
Together, the interaction of the subsystems determines the perfor-
Fig. 1. The relationship between factors affecting SUTP-freight (adapted and developed from Sjöstedt (1996)).
131
mance of the transport system. Industrial production facilities and
shopping centres are usually located within city borders as well as
transport infrastructure facilities like seaports or rail terminals. As
a consequence, logistics facilities like warehouses and terminals
are established in the vicinity of commercial centres and transport
infrastructure. Since economic activities require the movement of
goods, a prerequisite for a functioning urban economy is the acces-
sibility of goods to these facilities. Providing this accessibility is the
main function of urban freight transport and it is the accessibility
needs which drive the whole urban freight transport system. The
land use subsystem comprises the supply of transport infrastruc-
ture as well as the location of the facilities in relation to the traffic
infrastructure, which are both crucial factors for accessibility. In
the traffic system, actual physical movements of vehicles are rea-
lised in physical networks in which traffic units absorb infrastruc-
ture capacity. In the transport system, the demand for goods
movements to and from the facilities is matched by transport ser-
vices, which require vehicles to be moved.
Most of the negative impacts of freight transport take place at
the traffic system level where vehicles consume energy and pro-
duce emissions. However, the impacts are the result of the interac-
tion of goods, facilities, infrastructure and vehicles in the four
subsystems: accessibility, land use, transport, and traffic. Integra-
tion is at the core of any promising approach aiming to reduce
the impacts and achieve a sustainable urban freight transport sys-
tem. The subsystems: accessibility, land use, transport and traffic
need to be targeted in an integrated way, and local as well as exter-
nal factors need to be acknowledged.
3. Method
The framework highlights the important relationships between
different stakeholders interacting in the urban setting and affecting
the freight movement in urban areas, and analysing urban freight
transport planning needs to cover the contextual conditions arising
from the differing goals of the urban stakeholders. Case studies
deliberately cover contextual conditions as they investigate a con-
temporary phenomenon within real-life settings and are therefore
an appropriate approach especially when the boundaries between
phenomenon and context are not clearly evident (Yin, 2003).
Therefore, a case study approach has been used analysing urban
transport planning.
3.1. Case study sample
The empirical data for this paper was collected in the EU project
called BUSTRIP, Baltic Urban Sustainable Transport Implementa-
tion and Planning (UBC Commission on Environment, 2007). BU-
STRIP was one of the first European projects to test, further
develop and implement the concept of SUTP in concrete. The
132 M. Lindholm, S. Behrends / Journal of Transport Geography 22 (2012) 129–136
BUSTRIP project included 12 cities and regions in the countries
around the Baltic Sea. The empirical data was collected in three
steps: (1) a holistic self-assessment of the cities’ transport system
including passenger and freight transport (2) a holistic peer-review
of on the basis of the cities’ self-assessment and (3) an in-depth re-
view of the cities’ freight transport. The holistic self-assessment
and peer review was conducted in all twelve cities, while the in-
depth freight review was limited to four of the cities, namely; Bre-
men, Gdynia, Kaunas and Örebro (see Table 1). These selected four
cities represent substantially different ‘political and administrative
cultures’, since the study includes both cities from the old member
states (OMSs) of the European Union, i.e., Bremen and Örebro, as
well as cities from the new member states (NMSs), i.e., Gdynia
and Kaunas. Furthermore, the cities differ in size (Bremen ca.
500,000 inhabitants, Kaunas 320,000, Gdynia 250,000, Örebro
100,000) and geographical conditions (Bremen and Gdynia are port
cities, while Örebro and Kaunas are located within the country).
Common for all cities is the strong role of logistics and freight
transport for their local economy. Furthermore, the authors were
member of the peer-review team in these cities and therefore
had good knowledge of the urban transport system and planning
practices as well as relative easy access to the stakeholders to be
interviewed.
3.2. Data collection and analysis
The holistic self-assessment was conducted by the local author-
ities, where all current developments, plans and projects were
mapped in a ‘Self-assessment report’ based on a template for SUTP
(Wolfram, 2004). The report described the municipality profile
(e.g., geography, administration and political issues), the drivers
affecting mobility and transport (processes that influence the
transport activities), the impacts on urban sustainability (e.g., indi-
cators for emissions, safety and quality of urban life), as well as rel-
evant plans and policies. After the reports were finalised, the
holistic peer-reviews were conducted. A peer-review team consist-
ing of a group of experts, i.e. traffic planners and researchers from
the different project cities including the authors, reviewed the self-
assessment reports and then visited the cities. Over the course of a
week, the review team conducted interviews with, e.g., city repre-
sentatives, transport operators, politicians and other stakeholders
to monitor the contents of the self-assessment report, identify
missing pieces as well as help the city authority personnel find rel-
evant factors to act upon when planning and adopting a SUTP. In
the final step, an in-depth freight review in four of the cities (Bre-
men, Gdynia, Kaunas and Örebro) was conducted. In total 34 in-
depth freight interviews were conducted with actors representing
different aspects of the freight transport issue at various levels and
Table 1
Case study sample.
Self-assessment Peer review Freight review
Old EU-member states
Bremen (DE) X X X ered in the case studies is extensive and what will be presented
Göteborg (SE) X X
Kouvola Region (FI) X X
Örebro (SE) X X X
Sundsvall (SE) X X
Turku (FI) X X
New EU-member states
Gdynia (PL) X X X
Kaunas (LT) X X X City administration
Liepaja (LV) X X
Pärnu (EE) X X
Tartu (EE) X X
Vilnius (LT) X X
functions (Table 2). The actors interviewed were representatives of
the city administration (heads of departments, decision makers,
politicians, handling officers), organisations representing transport
customers, freight forwarders, transport operators and research
institutes. The same actor groups were interviewed in all four cities
and the questions were asked following an interview guide with
semi-structured and open-ended questions in order to obtain com-
parable results. The interviews included questions about munici-
pality profile, drivers, impacts, quality of urban life, problems,
plans and policies. Additional questions were asked in some inter-
views and in other cases it was not possible for all actors to answer
the questions. The interviews were performed by both authors in
all four cities and lasted about 1–2 h each. In addition, public re-
ports and planning documents about the cities’ transport systems
were reviewed to complement the data collection.
For each city, the notes from the interviews were summarised
and analysed through meaning condensation, meaning categorisa-
tion and thematic analysis, followed by an analysis of similarities
and differences between the case cities. The categories of the
framework developed in Section 2 structures the analysis to ex-
plain similarities and differences and to identify emerging relation-
ships. The holistic self-assessment and peer-review in twelve cities
together with the in-depth freight review in four cities are believed
to represent a qualitative view of the urban freight transport prob-
lems and possibilities for local authorities in many European cities,
not only for the case cities in the Baltic Sea Region.
4. Results and analysis
In this section, the results are presented and analysed. The col-
lected data was grouped in the categories of the framework devel-
oped in Section 2 (Fig. 1). In order to identify the current
shortcomings but also the potential of urban freight transport
planning the results are applied on a matrix developed by Behr-
ends et al. (2008). The matrix was developed based on an actor-
based model of a sustainable urban freight transport system, which
shows the complex relationships between different actors, how
they relate with different factors and hence the need for an inte-
grated approach that involves all actors. The matrix visualises the
actors, their responsibilities and the possible measures that can
be taken. As concluded by Behrends et al. (2008), the matrix shows
that all actors are affected by others in a causal chain of activities,
but that it is mainly one actor that dominates certain segments. By
setting requirements it is possible for actors to influence other ac-
tors and the final impacts. Further, the matrix shows the central
role of local authorities and planning agencies. Since they can influ-
ence all factors they play an important role in facilitating the re-
quired cooperation, which is needed for an integrated urban
freight transport planning.
It was implied in the paper by Behrends et al. that it would be of
interest to test the matrix on a real case. In this paper, the original
matrix is tested and further developed by combining the matrix
with the framework developed in Section 2. The information gath-
Table 2
Conducted interviews in the in-depth freight review.
Bremen Örebro Kaunas Gdynia
4 3 4 3
Transport customer 1 1 1
Freight forwarder 2 2 1 1
Transport operators 1 1 2 4
Research institute 1 1 1
 M. Lindholm, S. Behrends / Journal of Transport Geography 22 (2012) 129–136 133

here is only the most relevant information. The key results are
merged and included in the matrix (see Table 3).
As a simplification, the matrix does not include external factors
and impacts as columns. The external factors are beyond the direct
control of the actors; however, they could be influenced on a high-
er level by all actors, although not as a direct decision from the ac-
tors individually. The impacts are the result of the interaction of all
factors, although they mainly take place at the traffic system level
when vehicles consume energy and produce emissions. Moreover,
the technical capabilities which were a part of the matrix by Behr-
ends et al. (2008) have been excluded since they are considered to
be a part of both external factors and traffic in the model used here.
In the remainder of this section, the key results of the case stud-
ies are presented and analysed grouped in the categories: External
factors, planning principles, land use, accessibility, transport, traf-
fic, and impacts. Some key issues are highlighted with quotations
from the interviewees.
4.1. External factors
External factors are difficult for the local authority to influence
directly, e.g. national laws, cultural traditions or political struc-
tures. In the case cities, it is mainly local regulations of road infra-
structure that are highlighted, e.g., weight or time restrictions,
which need to be in line with national and European law. Imple-
menting a restriction of any kind in an urban area demands a polit-
ical willingness to do so, a good cooperation between departments
as well as a cultural acceptance. There are often long processes and
freight transport is seldom an area where this effort is put since
freight transport is usually not prioritised. While in the OMS there
is indication of an increased awareness about the necessity for
restrictive measures, the general opinion in the NMS is that the
market will help to solve the problems. Common in both OMS
and NMS is that freight transport gets very little room in local
budgets.
In all cities local authorities are hindered from working with,
e.g., infrastructure networks or financial instruments such as road
pricing on a larger scale since many of these are affected by na-
tional or even European legislation. The most obvious problem is
the railway infrastructure in the NMS. The wider Russian rail track
gauge gives poor prerequisites for using rail for long-haul transport
to the OMS.
4.2. Planning principles
There is a lack of awareness of freight transport problems and
possibilities. ‘‘There are more urgent matters to handle’’ and ‘‘We
never thought of the handling of freight issues’’ were two typical
comments from the interviewees. There is also a lack of freight
and logistics competence of planning personnel within local
authorities. In the NMS there is a lack of data regarding freight
transport (‘‘We don’t know much about freight transport, only that
they are in our way transporting passengers’’). There is no planning
department that dedicates time to freight transport issues,
although there is indication that this might be necessary to solve
urban freight problems. (‘‘We will probably need a division for
freight transport in the future, when it becomes a visible problem,
but this is not the fact or the priority right now.’’) The municipal-
ities in the OMS, on the other hand, have good data about freight
traffic in urban areas. However, their planning is limited to achiev-

Table 3
Key issues: potentials (+) and shortcomings ( ) of urban freight transport planning (adopted and developed from Behrends et al. (2008)).

Involved actors/ City administration/local authority Consignor/consignee Freight forwarder Transport operator
factors
Planning principles Lack of freight transport competence
(knowledge)
No long-term sustainable freight transport
strategy
Lack of freight data
Lack of cooperation with neighbouring
±Stakeholder consultation is good, but the
cooperation is lacking
+Awareness is growing
Land use
Infrastructure - The spatial planning to reduce urban Localisation of facilities, not Localisation of terminal, limited
Facilities sprawl does not include freight transport considering connections to by city spatial planning
transport infrastructure
Localisation of facilities,
limited by city spatial
planning
Accessibility
Facilities - goods +Cities improves prerequisite for logistics Lack of awareness how to Lack of alternatives to standard
connection to interregional networks affect transport via high quality service level (short
shipments (sizefrequency, lead times)
number etc.)
Transport
Goods-vehicles +Ideas for load factor regulations Lack of cooperation with External consolidation (lack of External consolidation (lack of
neighbouring facilities cooperation with competitors) cooperation with competitors)
+Internal consolidation The modal split is low
+Interna 1 consolidation
Traffic
Vehicles - Not sufficient infrastructure capacity n/a n/a Old vehiclefleet
infrastructure Lack of loading space Lack of alterntive fuels
Freight transport actions limited to achieve
traffic
+Alternative fuel infrastructure strategies
+Heavy vechicle regulations (low emission
zones, weight,time)
134 M. Lindholm, S. Behrends / Journal of Transport Geography 22 (2012) 129–136
ing traffic optimisation. Ambitious approaches to actively steer the
development have failed, which leads to reluctance in continuing
to work on these issues at a strategic level. There are long-term
strategies for sustainable development where land-use, transport
and traffic planning are included, but there is no evidence in the
form of documents showing that freight transport is embedded
in the overall sustainable development strategy. Kaunas, for exam-
ple, has established a coordination board on sustainability and as-
signed a sustainability deputy mayor, however, freight transport
and logistics issues are not included because it is not seen as a rel-
evant problem today.
Furthermore, regional integration of plans concerning freight
transport with neighbouring municipalities does not take place.
In both NMS and OMS there are procedures for regional coopera-
tion but they do not include freight and are not legally binding.
Additionally, there is evidence for competition between neigh-
bouring municipalities for logistics settlements and transport
infrastructure investments (e.g. intermodal terminal), undermin-
ing effective solutions for the region as a whole. A further short-
coming is the lack of cooperation between city departments,
which is especially valid in the NMS where the old hierarchical
administrative structures from the communist era still influence
the way of working. Nevertheless, the consultation with private
stakeholders is adequate in all cities even though a continued
cooperation is lacking. In Gdynia, all actors perceive that the coop-
eration with the city works well and that the city is a forerunner
compared to other cities in Poland. However, this may also cause
problems since there are indications that authorities are reluctant
to introduce restrictive measures against private stakeholders.
4.3. Land use
The city’s spatial planning often controls the localisation of all
types of facilities, and determines and hence influences the charac-
ter of freight movements. However, freight transport is rarely in-
cluded as a factor during the development of the land use plan.
This is a general problem in both OMS and NMS. The freight for-
warders always consider the available transport infrastructure for
accessing the facilities when planning localisation. The transport
buyers, on the other hand, are often more concerned with how
their customer can access the facilities rather than the possibilities
for freight vehicles providing material supply. A good example for
freight-related land-use planning is the freight village in Bremen,
which concentrates the transport and logistics intensive facilities
in one dedicated area with an intermodal terminal. Though the
usage of rail freight is limited, the geographical concentration of
a smaller number of distribution centres made distribution traffic
more efficient (‘‘the problem of many unutilised vehicles decreased
significantly by the introduction of the freight village’’). The access
roads connecting the freight village with the German motorway
network, however, partly lack capacity and cross sensitive urban
areas. Problematic examples regarding freight related land-use
planning are external shopping centres, which have been estab-
lished at the outskirts of all case cities while investments in the
central business district stagnate.
4.4. Accessibility
The expected economic growth during the next decades will lead
to more goods being produced and consumed in urban areas, espe-
cially in cities in the NMS. As a consequence of the expected growth
in freight transport common to all cities in the Baltic Sea Region is
the development of the logistics sector. All the evaluated cities see
themselves in a preferable location for logistics activities and they
actively market themselves, from the local authority planning
department or freight forwarder side, as a logistics hub with the goal
to establish more logistics and transport intensive companies. In
Kaunas for example, developing the city as a logistics centre is a pri-
ority in the strategic plan. Overall, goods demanding accessibility is
expected to continue to increase and the resulting growth in freight
traffic is likely to have negative consequences on both the service le-
vel of the urban transport system as well as urban sustainability.
Örebro highlights its central location in Sweden and potential to
limit the environmental impact from a national perspective if ware-
houses and distribution centres are established in their region, even
though the local impact increases.
4.5. Transport
Road transport dominates the modal split of inter-urban freight
transport. However, in many cases there are substantial waiting
times involved, e.g., due to congestion on access roads and terminal
queues. In Gdynia, traffic in peak-hours reduces the accessibility of
the port terminals substantially resulting in an additional transport
time of 1 h. There is a demand for rail services, which potentially can
offer better speeds and lower costs; however, infrastructure capac-
ity constraints lead to a lack of rail transport services. In all cities, the
freight forwarders do not use rail for their domestic transports any-
more and have road as the only alternative. The competitiveness
gap between road and rail has widened in recent years since infra-
structure investments are mainly made in road transport. In all cit-
ies there are or recently have been major road infrastructure
investments improving the accessibility of main logistics areas by
road, while there is no evidence for any recent investments in rail
infrastructure. (‘‘We have rail infrastructure included in the strate-
gic plan, but we don’t work with that – road is easier.’’) Furthermore,
in the NMS rail transport services suffer from interoperability prob-
lems between the European and Russian rail network resulting in a
significantly lower rail modal share for seaport hinterland transport
than in the OMS. The load factor of urban distribution vehicles is one
aspect that is discussed in some cities as a measure to increase
transport efficiency. However, there is a lack of cooperation
between shippers and transport operators. City logistics schemes
were tested in Bremen and Örebro but have not been successful
due to operational problems and lack of benefits for actors partici-
pating in the schemes. In the NMS willingness for cooperation
among actors is lacking, which is often explained by bad experi-
ences with forced unions in the communist era.
4.6. Traffic
The growth of traffic flows is a problem in all cities and it is ex-
pected to increase in the future. Hence, lack of traffic infrastructure
capacity is a common challenge. In the OMS, the infrastructure cur-
rently provides sufficient capacity; however, it will not be suffi-
cient to meet future demands. In the NMS, transport grew faster
than the infrastructure had been developed. Though significant
transport infrastructure is currently under construction, the
growth in capacity is still outpaced by the growth in demand for
freight transport. Hence, significant infrastructure investments
are required to secure accessibility.
Furthermore, lack of loading space in central business districts
causes problems for delivery operations and obstructs passenger
traffic. In all cities, congestion and lack of loading space is a threat
for reliable deliveries. In the NMS there is a general reluctance
against any restrictive measures among municipalities, transport
operators and customers while in the OMS the actors are aware
about the necessity for actions. However, implementation is diffi-
cult since planners fear a negative impact on the cities’ competitive-
ness. Most cities favour and encourage alternative fuels both in NMS
and OMS, but this encouragement is mainly directed towards pri-
vate passenger cars and public transport. There is in many cases
 M. Lindholm, S. Behrends / Journal of Transport Geography 22 (2012) 129–136
an alternative fuel infrastructure network dedicated for public
transport bus fleets that could also be used by freight vehicles. Fur-
thermore, in the OMS there are examples of technical solutions to
minimise freight traffic impacts, e.g. clean vehicle access to certain
areas, and Low Emission Zones.
4.7. Impacts
The unsustainable impacts of urban freight transport are a con-
sequence of many decisions as shown in Fig. 1. Nevertheless, there
is no clear connection made in any of the cities between environ-
mental impacts and freight transport, but there is a higher recogni-
tion of the freight transport problem in the OMS than in the NMS.
All of the cities face the challenge to meet the air quality standards
from the European Commission (Directive 2008/50/EC). Air quality
data is available, but the proportion of emissions from freight
transport is not known. Congestion is also a growing problem,
caused by private cars as well as freight transport. The main action
to reduce congestion is new infrastructure, both in OMS and NMS.
In the OMS, some actions have been tested to reduce the number of
freight vehicles in the central business districts, but these have led
to poor results with no obvious reduction of vehicles.
5. Discussion
The common challenge for the cities is that freight transport is
growing. Freight transport is needed for the cities to be liveable as
well as functional, but at the same time citizens perceive it as a dis-
turbing factor for local sustainability. The number of deliveries to
the city centres and through the cities as well as transports to
and from major gateways such as ports, rail terminals, distribution
centres and airports are increasing and therefore the emissions and
other negative effects also are.
There is indication for a raised awareness of the problem for
some actors, but the main area of interest for most local author-
ities is still public transport and handling the movement of pri-
vate cars. Awareness that freight transport is an increasing
contributing factor to negative environmental impacts is either
low or the knowledge of what to do is very limited. There are
examples of countries and specific cities that already include
freight transport in the transport planning process (e.g. Browne
et al., 2007). This study, however, confirms the conclusion from
Dablanc (2007) that a majority of the cities have not yet found
solutions to the freight transport problems.
On the other hand, local authorities recognise freight transport
as an important factor for the economic development of their re-
gions. All analysed cities currently aim for settlements of logistics
activities and plan for road infrastructure extensions to improve
their accessibility. However, the urban locality constrains the pos-
sibilities for capacity extensions for two reasons: First, logistics and
transport facilities compete with other land-use forms, e.g., non-
logistics businesses and housing, for a limited physical space, and
second, new investments or extensions of existing facilities are of-
ten opposed by adjacent residents because of the externalities that
increasing transport activities impose on them. This shows the
necessity to integrate transport planning with land-use planning
and the overall strategies of the cities as discussed by Banister
(2002).
Transport and logistics companies are aware of the increasing
problems that urban transport imposes on the performance of
their services; however, there is no or limited integration with
city authorities to discuss and to develop concrete actions to
solve these problems. Interaction between and cooperation of
all involved actors, i.e., actors from the public and private sector,
is necessary but lacking. The interviews corroborate previous re-
135
search (Dablanc, 2007) that the actors seem to be expecting ini-
tiatives to come from elsewhere. On the one hand, local
authorities see freight transport as a ‘business problem’ rather
than something that could be influenced by the local authorities.
A couple of the cities have tried strategies with different mea-
sures like weight or time restrictions for heavy vehicles with
the aim of reducing the negative impacts of freight traffic, but
so far few of those have been successful in a long-term perspec-
tive. Another reason for lack of commitment in taking action is
failure experiences, since many projects within the area of urban
freight transport have not led to any positive changes. Further-
more, local authorities are reluctant to impose restrictive mea-
sures on freight transport since these are seen as a risk for the
regional competitiveness. They expect businesses to set up new
logistics services suited to the emerging needs of the customers
and retailers. On the other hand, freight forwarders and transport
operators wait for municipalities to take the initiative for actions
to address urban freight transport problems.
Freight transport is a complex area and it is hard, if not to say
impossible, to compare to passenger transport (Allen and Browne,
2010). To overcome this barrier, city authorities need more capac-
ity and competence in logistics and freight transport. However, a
holistic understanding of the implications of freight transport in
urban areas is lacking. For local authorities freight transport is
not a high priority and there is an overall lack of knowledge in
the area. They perceive economic interests on the one hand and
environmental and social interests on the other hand as trade-offs
and there is no long-term strategy to balance these interests. This
is common for all four cities interviewed, and it seems like the dif-
ferences in history or in other patterns do not matter. Timms
(2011) claims that there are increasing opportunities for EU fund-
ing for projects that facilitate professional information exchange,
including the ‘‘real story’’. This could have an impact on knowledge
transfer. Timms (2011) confirms that most official reporting fo-
cuses on success stories. However, both success stories and failures
need to be reported and evaluated in order to learn from others’
mistakes and good practices. Another study (Marsden et al.,
2011) argues that although cities are actively looking to learn from
one another, they mainly rely on trusted peer to peer networks.
Therefore it is important to not only write reports on results, but
also to disseminate the results and the experiences orally.
Finally, urban freight transport planning needs to consider its
role in and connection to the wider regional and national trans-
port network, since urban freight transport is not an isolated sys-
tem. The shortcomings in urban freight transport planning have
implications for e.g. rail freight. The majority of all transports in
the analysed cities have truck as the only alternative, which con-
firms previous research that a modal shift is often not possible
since existing rail services are only suitable for long-distance
transport, i.e. 500 km and more (Chapman, 2007; Rich et al.,
2011). We also found evidence that constraints on the local road
network reduce the effectiveness of the collection and distribu-
tion to and from the intermodal terminals as discussed by Wood-
burn (2008). To achieve a modal shift, Haywood (1999) argues
that it is necessary for local authorities to develop local freight
transport strategies, which encompass rail freight. The identified
lack of urban freight transport strategies and logistics and freight
competence of urban planners consequently also affects the effi-
ciency of inter-regional rail networks, and hence limits the possi-
bilities of achieving the desired modal shift.
6. Conclusions
The purpose of this paper was, first, to analyse the current state
of freight transport in urban areas, and second, to identify possible
136 M. Lindholm, S. Behrends / Journal of Transport Geography 22 (2012) 129–136
shortcomings of current urban freight transport planning practices.
We have presented a qualitative view of the current state of freight
transport in urban areas as well as a framework highlighting the
apparent shortcomings in urban freight transport planning, based
on a case study of twelve cities. Results of the general transport sit-
uations in cities were in this study combined with freight transport
in particular.
The results show that freight transport services are increasingly
important for the regional competitiveness while freight traffic is a
growing threat for urban sustainability. In turn, the urban context
is a barrier for efficient freight operations. However, local authori-
ties as well as transport and logistics operators neglect these prob-
lems arising from freight in urban areas. Freight transport appears
in the periphery of urban transport planners’ daily work, but they
do neither know how nor have the capacity to tackle the issue. To
overcome the barriers, first of all an overall awareness is needed to
understand that urban freight transport is an area to work with for
both local authorities and transport operators. A deeper integration
of freight transport and urban sustainability strategies can be ben-
eficial for the efficiency of freight transport networks as well as for
local sustainability and regional competitiveness.
This article has identified shortcomings in urban freight trans-
port planning. How urban freight transport should be included in
the overall transport planning to overcome these shortcomings re-
mains still to be developed. One part of a solution must be an inte-
grated planning procedure, where all types of transport are included
– from walking and cycling, cars and public transport to freight
transport. There is a lack of role models and inadequate monitoring,
evaluation and dissemination of performed studies and projects,
which makes it hard to follow good experiences as well as to avoid
the bad examples. Sets of indicators do exist as well as planning
methods, but the next step needs to be the development of imple-
mentation guidelines and conceptual models. Focus areas for fur-
ther research can be summarised as follows:
 How to cooperate and communicate between and within city
authority departments as well as with private stakeholders
and other cities.
 How to inform about possible actions for different actors and
what steps that need to be taken to cope with the increasing
problem and to understand the improvement potential.
 How to increase logistics knowledge in order to understand
the factors affecting urban freight transport and to be able
to cope with the problems in order to understand the complex
nature of logistics and the difference to passenger mobility.
Acknowledgements
We thank the BUSTRIP project for useful input in this article as
well as the European Commission for funding the work. We espe-
cially thank the local authority administrations in the four cities
for in-depth freight interviews in this study, which were very gen-
erous with their time and work in helping us identify actors. We also
express gratitude to all interview respondents.
References
Allen, J., Browne, M., 2010. Considering the Relationship Between FREIGHT Transport
and Urban Form, Green Logistics. University of Westminster London, UK.
Anderson, S., Allen, J., Browne, M., 2005. Urban logistics – how can it meet policy
makers’ sustainability objectives? Journal of Transport Geography 13, 71–81.
Banister, D., 2002. Transport Planning. Taylor and Francis, London.
Banister, D., 2008. The sustainable mobility paradigm. Transport Policy 15, 73–80.
Behrends, S., Lindholm, M., Woxenius, J., 2008. The impact of urban freight
transport: a definition of sustainability from an actor’s perspective.
Transportation Planning and Technology 31, 693–713.
Bertolini, L., le Clercq, F., Kapoen, L., 2005. Sustainable accessibility: a conceptual
framework to integrate transport and land use plan-making. Two test-applications
in the Netherlands and a reflection on the way forward. Transport Policy 12, 207–
220.
Browne, M., Allen, J., Attlassy, M., 2007. Comparing freight transport strategies and
measures in London and Paris. International Journal of Logistics: Research &
Applications 10, 205–219.
CE Delft, 2008. Handbook on Estimation of External Cost in the Transport Sector.
Produced Within the Study Internalisation Measures and Policies for All
external Cost of Transport (IMPACT). CE Delft, Delft.
Chapman, L., 2007. Transport and climate change: a review. Journal of Transport
Geography 15, 354–367.
Crainic, T.G., Ricciardi, N., Storchi, G., 2004. Advanced freight transportation systems
for congested urban areas. Transportation Research Part C: Emerging
Technologies 12, 119–137.
Dablanc, L., 2007. Goods transport in large European cities: difficult to organize,
difficult to modernize. Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice 41,
280–285.
Docherty, I., 2004. Transport and regional economic competitiveness in the global
economy. Journal of Transport Geography 12, 341–342.
European Commission, 2006. Keep Europe Moving – Sustainable Mobility for Our
Continent – Mid-term Review of the European Commission’s 2001 White Paper
on Transport. Office for Official Publications of the European Communities,
Luxemburg.
European Commission, 2007. Green Paper: Towards a New Culture for Urban
Mobility. Office for Official Publications of the European Communities,
Luxemburg.
European Commission, 2009. A Sustainable Future for Transport: Towards an
Integrated, Technology-led and User-Friendly System, Brussels.
Geurs, K., van Wee, B., 2004. Land-use/transport interaction models as tools for
sustainability impact assessment of transport investments: review and research
perspectives. European Journal of Transport and Infrastructure Research 4, 333–
355.
Gutiérrez, J., Kitchin, R., Thrift, N., 2009. Transport and Accessibility, International
Encyclopedia of Human Geography. Elsevier, Oxford, pp. 410–417.
Hall, P.V., 2007. Global logistics and local dilemmas. In: International Conference on
Gateways and Corridors, Vancouver.
Haywood, R., 1999. Land development implications of the British rail freight
renaissance. Journal of Transport Geography 7, 263–275.
Hesse, M., Rodrigue, J.-P., 2004. The transport geography of logistics and freight
distribution. Journal of Transport Geography 12, 171–184.
Hull, A., 2005. Integrated policy planning in the UK: from concept to reality. Journal
of Transport Geography 13, 328–331.
Hull, A., 2008. Policy integration: what will it take to achieve more sustainable
transport solutions in cities? Transport Policy 15, 94–103.
INFRAS/IWW, 2004. External Costs of Transport – Update Study. INFRAS, IWW
Universität Karlsruhe, Zürich, Karlsruhe.
Lakshmanan, T.R., 2011. The broader economic consequences of transport
infrastructure investments. Journal of Transport Geography 19, 1–12.
Marsden, G., Frick, K.T., May, A.D., Deakin, E., 2011. How do cities approach policy
innovation and policy learning? A study of 30 policies in Northern Europe and
North America. Transport Policy 18, 501–512.
May, A.D., Roberts, M., 1995. The design of integrated transport strategies.
Transport Policy 2, 97–105.
May, A.D., Kelly, C., Shepherd, S., 2006. The principles of integration in urban
transport strategies. Transport Policy 13, 319–327.
Nijkamp, P., Abreu, M., 2009. Regional Development Theory, International
Encyclopedia of Human Geography. Elsevier, Oxford, pp. 202–207.
O’Kelly, M.E., 1998. A geographer’s analysis of hub-and-spoke networks. Journal of
Transport Geography 6, 171–186.
Potter, S., Skinner, M.J., 2000. On transport integration: a contribution to better
understanding. Futures 32, 275–287.
Rich, J., Kveiborg, O., Hansen, C.O., 2011. On structural inelasticity of modal
substitution in freight transport. Journal of Transport Geography 19, 134–146.
Rodrigue, J.-P., Slack, B., Comtois, C., 2006. The Geography of Transport Systems.
Routledge, Abingdon, Oxon, England; New York.
Sjöstedt, L., 1996. A Theoretical Framework – From an Applied Engineering
Perspective, Mobility, Transport and Traffic in the Perspective of Growth,
Competitiveness, Employment, Paris, pp. 71–79.
Timms, P., 2011. Urban transport policy transfer: ‘‘bottom-up’’ and ‘‘top-down’’
perspectives. Transport Policy 18, 513–521.
UBC Commission on Environment, 2007. Moving Sustainably: Guide to Sustainable
Urban Transport Plans. Union of Baltic Cities Commission on Environment,
Turku, Finland.
Wolfram, M., 2004. Expert Working Group on Sustainable Urban Transport Plans,
Cologne.
Woodburn, A., 2008. Intermodal rail freight in Britain: a terminal problem?
Planning Practice and Research 23, 441–460.
Yin, R.K., 2003. Case Study Research – Design and Methods. Sage Publications,
Londion.
Zunder, T.H., Ibáñez, J.N., 2004. Urban freight logistics in the European Union.
European Transport 28, 77–84.