Freight: The Final Frontier of Local Transport Planning

On 14 July 2022 the 13th event in the PTRC Fireside Chat Series took place. It followed publication a month before of the UK Government’s Future of Freight Plan . The Plan highlights the immediate challenges facing the freight and logistics industry; the sector is “emerging from the operational challenge of the COVID-19 pandemic and the transition to a new relationship with the EU whilst managing the impacts of the Russia-Ukraine war and longer-term implications for the global free-trade system. As well as managing the issues of today it must also look to the future and to meeting the opportunities and challenges of the transition to net zero, ensuring it has the right skills and people, changing consumer trends, and new technology”.

As a transport planner I have to hold my hand up and say I am one of the many who has only a limited knowledge of the movement of goods, having spent the majority of my career focused upon movement of people. The Fireside Chat was an illuminating glimpse into the multi-faceted world of freight that for our panellists is far from being unfamiliar.

With 100+ people joining us for the event, I had the pleasure of chairing the discussion and learning from our excellent panel:

What follows is an account of the key points that stood out for me and thoughts that were provoked, having had the privilege of exploring the topic with the panel and questions from our audience. You also have the opportunity to (re)watch the whole event on YouTube . I encourage you to do so to fully experience the richness of what was explored, including the audience commentary.

You may be wondering how jelly and Star Trek come to be sharing in the portrayal of this event’s write-up. Well, we began with ‘Freight: The Final Frontier’; as for the jelly, you will have to read on.

Setting the context

According to Statistica “The number of packages sent in the United Kingdom has increased exponentially between 2013 and 2021. Approximately 4.2 billion parcels were sent in the 2020/2021 fiscal year. This was an increase of over 1.3 billion parcels relative to the previous year”. According to the RAC Foundation : the number of licenced vans in Britain more or less doubled in 25 years between 1994 and 2019, as did van traffic; and between a quarter and third of HGVs are driving around empty. There are significant dynamics in the freight and logistics industry.

If you don’t work in that industry it’s easy for goods movement and the industry itself to be largely invisible, unless you are stuck behind a slow-moving lorry, struggling to get past a delivery van parked on the pavement, or out for an early morning walk in a city centre listening to a chorus of beeps and ‘warning, this vehicle is reversing’.

Goods appear as if by magic on the supermarket shelves, through our letter boxes and under Christmas trees. They could have travelled thousands of miles, on different modes, through check points and will have involved handlers, HGV drivers and last mile delivery drivers. Even drones don’t magic away the socio-technical complexities of supply-chains.

I was reading a Guardian article recently on “The hidden life of a lorry driver”. Long shifts, absent from their families, an ageing male workforce, driver shortage, shortage of staff to unload cargos, endless waiting, little public sympathy concerning vehicle parking, and physical and mental health issues. Here’s a shocking story of a driver disturbed in his sleep on his lorry as the cargo on his curtain-sided trailer is being stolen: “he pulled back the curtain on the passenger side of the cab. A man was standing there. He put one finger on his lips and slid another across his throat. Ten accomplices unloaded the van. Piper called the police, but they said there was nothing they could do. Afterwards, a doctor signed him off work for a week and prescribed him anti-anxiety medication.” A more sobering insight there into what the magic can really involve.

Moving from the frontline to academia, goods movement can often still appear the poor relation to people movement. Within the world of transport studies I can point to innumerable academics involved with passenger transport but almost count on a hand or two the go-to experts I’m aware of who specialise in goods movement.

Perhaps it’s just that I inhabit a different network, and in fact communities of academic research into freight and logistics are alive, well and thriving. Nevertheless, what this might suggest is that the professional networks are not interacting enough – and at what cost to how our transport system evolves, and is used, we might ask?

This is pertinent to the new guidance for Local Transport Plans in England being developed by the Department for Transport. Such plans will continue to shape and hopefully decarbonise our urban areas in uncertain times, and goods movement is surely integral to that.

The Future of Freight Plan notes “[a] disconnect exists between industry, that is not equipped to properly engage with planning processes, and local planning authorities, that are unable to understand the needs of a changing and innovative freight and logistics sector”. Raising the status of Freight is a key concern of this Government Plan and yet the document concedes that “There is limited understanding on the future skills mix and what government needs to do to support industry to address future skill gaps”.

So, with that new White Paper helping set the scene, how much of a challenge lies ahead for freight, is it really the Cinderella of the transport system, and what could and should change to offer a positive outlook for the future after the multiple shocks the industry has been navigating of late? We now turn to what the panel had to say to learn more.

Freight doesn’t vote but it does wobble

Maggie referred to ‘freight blindness’ (ignorance) – people just don’t see freight. However, she noted how this has changed because of Covid-19 (toilet rolls) and Brexit (driver shortages and queues). Freight doesn’t get noticed until there is a problem. Linked to this she makes the point that “freight doesn’t vote” (unless there is a (persistent) problem) in the way people do and also that it tends to play out at global or national scales in terms of supply chains and movements of goods. This contributes to its invisibility in local transport planning (a point re-emphasised by Andrew in terms of freight becoming a more detached consideration which is poorly understood at a site or location-specific level). The freight and logistics sector is adaptive and Maggie likens it to a jelly – “you can wobble it and wobble it and generally speaking it wobbles and bounces back, but if you shake the plate enough you end up with an unholy mess”. When journey times become less reliable, the jelly starts to wobble. When rest areas are not adequate or safe, the jelly starts to wobble. When drivers are exhausted or in short supply, the jelly starts to wobble.

Freight is important but disconnected

Andrew underlined why freight is important, “freight is more than just things that we buy” he reminds us, “it services the the restaurants we eat at the cinemas we might go to and also services the hospitals and medical facilities we use”. He points out that waste collection is another form of freight movement. Daniela did, however, also point out that “the UK is the third largest market for online shopping and home deliveries in the world” (after the US and China).

Supply chain resilience and sustainability are a key consideration in the industry now and for this there is a reliance on the transport network itself. However, the transport network, and changes to it, can be a contested space with competing interests. The interests of goods movement are not often well represented – or are hived off separately in terms of strategy documents. Policy documents and aspirations do not necessarily translate into material influence in practice (particularly if the public sector has less or no visibility of relevant data that is held in the private sector). The perennial challenge of integration raises its head – freight needs to be part of a joined-up consideration of what the transport network is for and how it evolves.

Please guide us

Daniela remains somewhat perplexed by how transport planning and policy seems to target measures and interventions concerning movement of people over movement of foods, not least because freight transport accounts for around one third of overall carbon emissions from the transport sector, she suggests, with roads freight a major part of this. She is critical of the Transport Decarbonisation Plan in terms of its lack of direction to local authorities for addressing goods movements in their areas. She has recently undertaken work for the Local Government Association on the future of last-mile deliveries. She says “local authorities are a bit lost when we discuss freight issues and potential solutions to reduce the externalities produced by trade movements”; and adds that many “feel they don't have enough capacity or capabilities to fully understand what to do to address local freight issues and also how they can align with national thinking”. Insufficient integration between local and central government is a problem with lack of sufficient powers and funding at a local level to deliver what may be appropriate for instance in relation to large-scale use of cargo bikes or compulsory consolidation centres. I find all this rather troubling and it surely puts an onus on forthcoming revisions to local transport planning guidance to help address it? Daniela acknowledged reference to planning in the Future of Freight Plan but reiterates her concern that local authorities are not well-equipped to tackle the freight problems, even if they recognise the problems themselves. More in-depth detailed guidance is required.

Do you need all that stuff?

Demand management is an important consideration in Daniela’s view. It has become too easy to have goods delivered at home and then returned ‘for free’ if unsuitable. Consumption and forms of expectation from goods movement and related pricing need addressing. It is not just about making goods movement itself more efficient and sustainable when it occurs, it is about addressing the total amounts of goods moved. There is a role for communication and engagement to help influence behaviours. Buying less as part of the response to addressing goods movement doesn’t sit easily with local politicians but Daniela nevertheless feel some encouragement to reflect upon consumption could be helpful as well as placing greater emphasis on retailers to address the externalities of their operations and the goods movement they rely upon.

In my mind was the notion that just because goods movement ‘works’ in terms of meeting the immediate needs of its users, doesn’t mean it works in the broader sense for society at large or at least is contributing in the best way to the sorts of outcomes that might be needed (something Claire addressed). Maggie meanwhile flagged the tensions created in a fragile economy of discouraging consumption of goods in pursuit of environmental imperatives. Similarly, efforts to achieve greater consolidation may have better environmental outcomes but comes at a cost – that is passed on to the consumer (not easy in the face of a cost of living crisis sat alongside the climate crisis).

Partnership in order to plan shared space

Mike picked up on earlier points about the national and global nature of freight and logistics which can be misunderstood or overlooked at more local scales. Goods movement in an urban area cannot be isolated from the peri-urban and regional dimensions. Overlooking freight should be of growing concern if we are keen to see less dependence on the private car because people may become more reliant on home deliveries. Since 2006 Mike has chaired the Central London Freight Quality Partnership. He has found it a real eye-opener in gaining insights into the day-to-day challenges faced by players in the industry. He has seen the value in shared conversation and insight, endorsing Daniela’s and Andrew’s earlier remarks.

The heterogeneity of freight is significant in Mike’s view. On the one hand, to engage people in addressing freight in planning requires more insight than ‘it’s all just freight’ but if the different sorts of freight and logistics are considered in detail then it makes it harder for non-specialists to remain engaged. Inescapably, the reality is, according to Mike, that “freight is such a complex mix of activities going across all kinds of different distances and particularly different spaces so when we think about how space works and how spatial planning works of course freight is difficult to deal with”. Movement of goods can tend to distract from the need also to consider the spatial aspects, notably how goods vehicles are accommodated when stationary (loading and unloading). The kerbside is a contested space that can lead to compromises and potentially conflicts. It’s a prime example (but there are many others) of a part of a system that is subject to multiple needs and uses (something the new Chief Executive of the CILT, Sharon Kindleysides, has also highlighted). Once again this highlights the need for a joined-up-thinking approach to our transport system and built environment where we consider both people and goods movement in a more integral way. Meanwhile in terms of urban mobility planning, European guidance centres upon Sustainable Urban Mobility Plans (principally for people) and Sustainable Urban Logistics Plans (for goods) – given the shared infrastructure, “clearly we have to deal with the problem together at some point” says Mike.

Outcomes focused and appropriately resourced

Claire was involved in a piece of work that reported earlier this year called ‘Delivering a Greener Future ’ which considers the state of play for freight and logistics in our city regions. This considers goods movement into and within urban areas and how best to distribute, consolidate and deliver. Not surprisingly, working for the Urban Transport Group, Claire recognises the importance of a partnership approach to shared problems across urban areas – and there are some good examples of such partnerships (following on from the one Mike is involved with). However, she is frustrated by a sense that the reality is often more silo-based in terms of responding to and shaping change with transport planners being passenger-focused and other stakeholders separately focusing upon cost efficient delivery of goods. Instead, Claire would like to see a focus on shared priorities and outcomes instead (for example “delivering greener, fairer, happier, healthier and more prosperous places”). She thinks the ‘Avoid-Shift-Improve’ approach to personal tripmaking could also be applied to goods movement.

To add to the challenges for local transport planning mentioned already, Claire reminded us of the highly constrained environments local authorities operate in with limited resources: “we've got lots of really great people in our authorities but you know they're really stretched and trying to do lots of different things and don't necessarily have the specific expertise in freight and logistics” (something also reflected in the Future of Freight Plan). It’s not necessarily the case that local authorities don’t recognise the importance of goods movement, it’s that they lack the resources to address it. She noted the familiar story of ‘ad-hoc competition’ funding available to local authorities which can be very hard to align with a long-term strategic planning approach. Added to this, funding can be available for trials, but even when these appear successful, there is not the support for scaling up.

It keeps coming back to joined-up planning

Having heard from our panellists a question from the audience was about why aren’t houses designed with parcel lockers. Perhaps this joins a queue of other such questions to do with charging points, cycle storage, solar panels and so on. Similar issues apply to ill-thought-through design of office buildings when it comes to goods deliveries or changes of use of buildings (such as banks becoming restaurants and then struggling with delivery issues). Another example is of damage to new street paving from goods vehicles because no-one thought through how the shops in that street were going to be serviced. The concept of 15-minute neighbourhoods similarly cannot afford to overlook how such neighbourhoods will be support in terms of movement of goods. Cargo bikes have a part to play but they aren’t the answer for everything when it comes to the volumes of goods being moved and delivered. Focusing upon more joined up planning is a key part of the challenge.

Responsible innovation and integrated LTPs

Within the freight and logistics industry itself there is competition but also scope for co-operation. It can be tempting to turn to regulation but without care, pursuit of the best could be the enemy of the good. The industry is adaptive and responsive to change and can service requirements most of the time. Regulation could stifle innovation and fail to realise the benefits of this adaptive capacity. It was suggested that perhaps standards to encourage good design might be more appropriate, as well as government incentives to innovate.

It would be all to easy to postpone addressing some of these difficult issues but if they are not managed then the jelly may start to wobble more than we feel comfortable with. My great hope as we look outwards from this session is that the looming round of new local transport plans will really take the opportunity, with or without strong support from national government, to work cooperatively in order to manage these issues.