Receivers’ willingness-to-adopt novel urban goods distribution practices

There is no doubt that goods transport continues to play a vital role in today’s society, in spite of the advances made with new information and communications technologies. The main objective of this research is to analyse the behaviour of goods receivers in two Spanish cities (Santander and Barcelona) when they are confronted with the possibility of adopting new goods distribution practices. The new goods distribution policies proposed to the receivers were: an Off-Hour Deliveries policy (OHD) and a policy which uses Urban Distribution Centres (UDC). The methodology used was based on a stated preference survey and a Mixed Logit model. The results show that in both cases, receivers generally do not wish to change the manner in which they receive their goods, especially if such change involves increased costs. However, both policies were generally more accepted in a medium size city like Santander than in Barcelona, and some results can be achieved even without tax reductions which will result in fewer distribution vehicles circulating at peak times and therefore less congestion and pollution on urban streets. In addition, it is important to consider that not all the commercial sectors react the same way, so this heterogeneity has to be taken into account in the specification of the models and in the proposed policies.