Flow Management of Passengers and Goods Coexisting in the Urban Environment: Conceptual and Operational Points of View

Our research aims to define a model which constitutes a first framework to plan and to control both passengers and goods flows in the urban environment. It focuses on the sharing concept which means to make a joint use of transport resources between passengers and goods flows. The proposed concept leans on the statement that: “There is sufficient overlap between passenger & freight urban transport systems to be able to build on and integrate existing infrastructure of both passenger & freight systems” [1]. Consequently, to integrate passenger & freight flows in the existing urban transport systems, it is necessary to characterize this overlap, which means to quantify both flows. Starting from freight flows, our paper presents a methodology aiming to define an appropriate sizing of delivery volumes by business type. The methodology has been implemented in a French medium sized city: La Rochelle.