The impact of urban freight transport: a definition of sustainability from an actors perspective

Journal article, 2008

The purpose of this article is to firstly, present a definition of sustainable urban freight transport (SUFT) based on existing theories, and secondly to develop an indicator set that describes SUFT. The definition of SUFT makes a categorisation of actions possible which enables the actors to select effective strategies towards SUFT. The indicator set consists of two levels: 1. impact indicators which describe how urban freight transport violates the principles of sustainability; and 2. performance indicators which describe different categories determining the characteristics and performance of the urban transport system. A literature study is conducted to analyse the characteristics determining the performance of the actors in the urban freight transport chain. Knowing the current state and improvement potentials of the urban freight transport system are prerequisites for defining successful strategies and implementing effective actions.