Determining time windows in urban freight transport: A city cooperative approach

Many cities have implemented delivery time windows, which limit city center access for freight vehicles. Each city determines its time windows independently. However, time window restrictions of one city also affect store deliveries in neighbouring cities, since retailers combine deliveries to customers in different cities in a single trip. We develop a cooperative game-theoretic approach to find better time windows than those currently used. A study of three cities and three retail chains illustrates the approach. Compared to the current situation, we find time windows that improve all the city satisfactions, while they hardly impact the retailers' efficiencies.