Valerio Gatta

Università Degli Studi Roma Tre | UNIROMA3

Heterogeneity in agents’ preferences is generally analysed through mixed logit models, which assume taste parameters are distributed in the population according to a certain mixing distribution. As a result, if the utility function is linear in attributes, the willingness to pay is the ratio of two random parameters and is itself random. This paper...

The urban freight sector provides an essential service by delivering goods that are required by shops, companies, and households at a specific place and time. However, the growth of e-commerce and the dawn of on-demand logistics (hereinafter ODL) have raised citizens’ expectations of logistics systems, further stressing them and thereby increasing...

50 days' free access to the paper via: https://authors.elsevier.com/a/1gA6ohVEB4--U Heterogeneity in agents’ preferences is generally analysed through mixed logit models, which assume taste parameters are distributed in the population according to a certain mixing distribution. As a result, if the utility function is linear in attributes, the will...

Surges in e-commerce sales represent a huge challenge for urban freight transport. Parcel lockers constitute a valid solution for addressing the challenges home deliveries imply. In fact, eliminating courier–consumer contact (also relevant for health-related issues, as made evident by the COVID-19 pandemic) and delivering in fewer predefined places...

This paper investigates tourists' preferences in Rome (Italy) with respect to their “last mile” transport walking experience. Stated preference experiments and discrete choice models are used to estimate tourists' preferences for alternative walking paths configurations, taking into account path characteristics and conditions (e.g. public services...

Despite the huge growth in online purchases, e-grocery (i.e. ordering grocery online) was still limited in scope in Italy so far. More recently, its growth has been substantial and 2020 witnessed a huge increase due to COVID-19-related mobility restrictions. In principle, e-grocery could reduce the number of shopping trips, yet an exponential incre...

This article will provide an overview of the economics of urban freight transport (UFT), focusing on the efficiency and sustainability of solutions, which can be guaranteed only via an appropriate planning and coordination between public and private interests. Standard economic theory also applies to UFT, however, its practical use is much hampered...

E-grocery is becoming more and more popular, involving both pure e-commerce players and physical stores in its development and sales. As a consequence, the last mile delivery model has been heavily modified, with ambiguous final impact on the environment. This paper identifies the key elements germane to e-grocery (demand and supply), discusses e-g...

E-grocery is the fastest growing e-commerce segment, while still a niche market. Notwithstanding the channel choice when buying groceries might have relevant transport and environmental implications, little attention is paid to demand analysis. The paper fills this research gap, by using stated preferences to estimate market shares for e-grocery, d...

The Sustainable Urban Mobility Plan (SUMP) has been identified as the privileged tool for addressing economic, social, and environmental issues in transport policy at the urban scale from a long-term strategic perspective. Indeed, urban policymakers intend adopting measures to cope with the negative externalities generated by transport. The focus i...

This paper analyzes the airport/airline choice behavior of tourists for Saxony/Germany. We employ flexible parametric choice methods (mixed logit) in order to test the effect of standard attributes on the choice probability. In addition we extend existing literature with the introduction of parking charges in the choice experiment. Our results show...

Freight transport is a complex world characterized by the presence of numerous actors with heterogeneous interests. Besides, given its high impacts at an urban level, appropriate solutions are needed toward sustainability and efficiency. However, policies are effective only if the impacted agents adopt them and change their behavior. To do this, a...

Widespread adoption of green vehicles in urban logistics may contribute to the alleviation of problems such as environmental pollution, global warming, and oil dependency. However, the current adoption of green vehicles in the last mile logistics is relatively low despite many actions taken by public authorities to overcome the negative externaliti...

Poor logistics efficiency, due to low load factors caused by high demand fragmentation, will have relevant negative consequences for cities in terms of pollution, congestion and overall city liveability. Policy-makers should equip themselves with appropriate tools to perform reliable, comprehensive and timely analyses of urban logistics scenarios,...

Crowdsourced delivery services (crowdshipping) represent a shipping alternative to traditional delivery systems, particularly suitable for e-commerce. Although some benefits in terms of reduced pollution and congestion could be obtained by replacing dedicated freight trips, the impacts of crowdshipping are unclear and depend on several factors such...

This paper presents a modelling framework to investigate the potential acceptability of digitalized services connected to groceries, i.e. e-grocery, via a discrete choice agent-based approach. A preliminary investigation of consumers’ preferences for buying groceries on-line has been performed via a stated preference survey. Besides, a new agent-ba...

Abstract Cities crave innovative logistics solutions dealing with the requirements of the ‘on demand economy’. The paper estimates the willingness to act as a crowdshipper (supply) and to buy a crowdshipping service (demand) to get goods delivered/picked-up in the last mile B2C e-commerce situation. Specifically, it innovates by considering an envi...

The paper considers random utility models that use a single common vector of random utilities for the computation of best, worst and best–worst choice probabilities, i.e. consistent models. Choice probabilities are derived for two distributions of the random terms: i.i.d. extreme value, i.e. Logit, and multivariate normal, i.e. Probit. We prove str...

Many cities of different size and in different areas of the world have successfully tested the introduction of off-hour deliveries (OHD) on a voluntary basis, reporting positive effects, both on freight distribution efficiency and sustainability. However, those initiatives have not been implemented so far at a large scale. This paper investigates O...

This paper aims at understanding and evaluating the environmental and economic impacts of a crowdshipping platform in urban areas. The investigation refers to the city of Rome and considers an environmental-friendly crowdshipping based on the use of the mass transit network of the city, where customers/crowdshippers pick-up/drop-off goods in automa...

Freight transport is responsible for a relevant percentage of CO2 emissions. Policies aimed at stimulating green freight transport should mitigate the CO2 emissions that the transport sector produces. Fostering consumer’s green behavior is fundamental to reduce the impact transportation has on the environment. One can pursue this goal by stimulatin...

A recent trend to engage and promote sustainable behaviors in transport foresees gamification, i.e. the use of game design elements in nongame contexts. To foster the expected behavior change, one should appropriately conceive, deploy and manage gamification. The paper addresses the problem of gamification design by proposing an advanced user-cente...

In this paper we introduce Pipe §Net, an innovative solution for the transport of goods via depressurised pipes. This technology is often referred to as the "fifth mode of transport" and constitutes a sustainable alternative to existing transport modes. The goal of Pipe §Net is to relieve congested European transportation networks and to provide a...

Well-being and economic growth are strictly correlated. Cities are the engines of an innovation-based economy where research and new ideas are the core input of production. Urbanisation is becoming synonymous of economic growth. People flock into cities, both in the developed and developing world, since here is where wealth is, where high quality s...

Employers often provide employees with either subsidized or free parking at work. This distorts relative prices of alternative commuting modes and produces inefficiencies in the transport market. To mitigate this price distortion, parking cash-out has been suggested as an effective and efficient policy to reduce single occupancy car commuting trips...

This chapter tests stakeholder acceptability and their likely behavior change with respect to innovative solutions for improving urban freight transport efficiency and fostering city sustainability. It presents the case of the Rome LL within the EU CITYLAB project, where an innovative system for integrating direct and reverse logistic flows in the...

The objective of the CITYLAB project is to develop knowledge and solutions that result in roll-out, upscaling and further uptake of cost effective strategies, measures and tools for emission free city logistics. CITYLAB includes a set of Living Laboratories where promising logistic concepts are implemented related to emissions free city logistics....

CITYLAB focuses on four axes that call for improvement and intervention: • Highly fragmented last-mile deliveries in city centres • Inefficient deliveries to large freight attractors and public administrations • Urban waste, return trips and recycling • Logistics sprawl Within these axes, the project supports seven implementations that are being te...

The European Commission (EC) has recently developed a growing awareness and interest with respect to the challenges urban freight transport (UFT) poses. Consequently, the EC has started defining specific policies and promoted dedicated tools to address them. Transport is a shared responsibility between the EU and the Member States, where the subsid...

The paper analyses the willingness to act as a crowdshipper in the case of a last mile B2C e-commerce for pick up/delivery. Specifically, it focuses on crowdshipping services deployed using the public transport network and considering passengers as crowdshippers already moving for other reasons. In fact, this is the most environmental-friendly type...

Many good solutions for the cost-effective and sustainable organization of urban freight last mile distribution have been tested and implemented. But mostly, the solutions are implemented in the context of one respective pioneer city. In the Horizon 2020 CIVITAS City Logistics in Living Laboratories project (CITYLAB) seven innovative urban freight...

This paper addresses the complex problem of multi-stakeholder decisions in urban freight transport policy-making from a public authority perspective, by proposing a procedure based on a modelling approach to support stakeholder involvement in the decision-making process. The paper analyses the existing methods that can be used for participatory dec...

This paper discusses the potential benefits of combining discrete choice models (DCMs) and agent-based models (ABMs) to provide a stakeholder behavioural analysis and support stakeholder engagement in urban freight transport (UFT) planning. The integrated modelling framework allows to evaluate stakeholders’ policy acceptability taking into account...

Abstract This paper proposes a novel approach to support participatory decision-making processes in the context of urban freight transport through the integration of discrete choice modeling and agent-based modeling. The methodology is based on an innovative multilayer network and opinion dynamics models and applied to the case study of Rome’s limi...

This paper proposes an innovative approach to decision-making processes for urban freight planning that could easily be transferred across cities while capable of jointly taking into account: (1) all the conceivable and updated urban freight transport (UFT) measures that should apply to the specific city culture, structure and evolution, (2) all th...

Logistical inefficiencies can be assimilated to taxes. In fact, in the case of Italy, each citizen pays around 700 euros per year due to road congestion that increases noxious emissions and lengthens travel times (Confcommercio and Isfort, 2015). The externalities induced by the vehicles in the cities can be decreased by reducing the total number of...

The analysis of quality of services is an important issue for the planning and the management of many businesses. The ability to address the demands and the relevant needs of the customers of a given service is crucial to determine its success in a competitive environment. Many quantitative tools in the areas of statistics and mathematical modeling...