Customer mobility and congestion in supermarkets

The analysis and characterization of human mobility using population-level mobility models is important for numerous applications, ranging from the estimation of commuter flows in cities to modeling trade flows between countries. However, almost all of these applications have focused on large spatial scales, which typically range between intra-city scales to inter-country scales. In this paper, we investigate population-level human mobility models on a much smaller spatial scale by using them to estimate customer mobility flow between supermarket zones. We use anonymized, ordered customer-basket data to infer empirical mobility flow in supermarkets, and we apply variants of the gravity and intervening-opportunities models to fit this mobility flow and estimate the flow on unseen data. We find that a doubly-constrained gravity model and an extended radiation model (which is a type of intervening-opportunities model) can successfully estimate 65--70\% of the flow inside supermarkets. Using a gravity model as a case study, we then investigate how to reduce congestion in supermarkets using mobility models. We model each supermarket zone as a queue, and we use a gravity model to identify store layouts with low congestion, which we measure either by the maximum number of visits to a zone or by the total mean queue size. We then use a simulated-annealing algorithm to find store layouts with lower congestion than a supermarket's original layout. In these optimized store layouts, we find that popular zones are often in the perimeter of a store. Our research gives insight both into how customers move in supermarkets and into how retailers can arrange stores to reduce congestion. It also provides a case study of human mobility on small spatial scales

New trends on urban goods movement: Modelling and simulation of e-commerce distribution

In this paper, a modelling framework to complete the recent scientific works on urban goods modelling is proposed. More precisely, we introduce a substitution procedure that estimates the number of trips and the corresponding travelled distances for shopping drive, home delivery and reception points' strategies. Moreover, an appraisal of scenarios is proposed in order to study how these three new forms of proximity delivery services impact on the overall urban goods movement distribution. Starting from four extreme situations, we introduce more realistic scenarios in order to find a suitable combination of delivery strategies. All the scenarios are simulated using the proposed framework, and the main traffic issues related to e-commerce distribution channel are discussed. The best realistic combination promotes the joint usage of home deliveries and proximity reception points and allows a reduction of about 13% of the road occupancy rates in urban areas.urban goods movement, modelling, shopping trips, e-commerce

Modelling COVID-19 transmission in supermarkets using an agent-based model.

Since the outbreak of COVID-19 in early March 2020, supermarkets around the world have implemented different policies to reduce the virus transmission in stores to protect both customers and staff, such as restricting the maximum number of customers in a store, changes to the store layout, or enforcing a mandatory face covering policy. To quantitatively assess these mitigation methods, we formulate an agent-based model of customer movement in a supermarket (which we represent by a network) with a simple virus transmission model based on the amount of time a customer spends in close proximity to infectious customers (which we call the exposure time). We apply our model to synthetic store and shopping data to show how one can use our model to estimate exposure time and thereby the number of infections due to human-to-human contact in stores and how to model different store interventions. The source code is openly available under https://github.com/fabianying/covid19-supermarket-abm. We encourage retailers to use the model to find the most effective store policies that reduce virus transmission in stores and thereby protect both customers and staff

Sustainable urban logistics solutions for the city of Kaunas

The main objective of this research project is to develop sustainable measures for the improvement of urban logistics in the city of Kaunas. The project is focusing on the sustainable approach to evaluate the viability of its measures. In other words, it considers the feasibility of the measures depending on the social, economic, and environmental effects that they could have. Firstly, it is analyzed the problems caused by logistic activities in Kaunas. Some of the problems have deep consequences for Kaunas citizens and might even be worse in future scenarios. The analysis tries to draw all the logistic scenario existing in the city. Kaunas, as an important logistic “pole” of Lithuania, has some important logistic platforms that must be considered. Besides, it is also analyzed different levels of administration, the developed plans of each of them, and the stakeholders related to different economic activities. To conclude the analysis and provide a more extended context, it is done a benchmarking of different successful measures developed in other cities. Finally, it is proposed two related measures. In the first place, it is located an urban distribution center by using Brown & Gibson Methodology and utility function. Secondly, it is developed a bicycle logistic system for the operation of the located distribution center. By using Clarke & Wright algorithm, it is designed the capacity and the necessary routes to serve the potential demand of the urban distribution center

Understanding the older traveller: stop, look and listen!

Getting around would be difficult without roads, rail and pedestrian walkways. Despite what we take for granted, the older traveller is often left feeling frustrated by the current transport infrastructure. Based on their research, Dr Greg Marsden et al explore in this article why this is the case, they look at the barriers that prevent older people getting out and about and the considerations when planning transport for the older traveller

Internal report cluster 1: Urban freight innovations and solutions for sustainable deliveries (3/4)

Technical report about sustainable urban freight solutions, part 3 of

The effects of home delivery on access to food products: the case of supermarkets and cybermarkets in the metropolitan area of Dijon (France)

International audienceHome delivery is a service proposed by supermarkets either via online shopping or after shopping in the store and consists in transporting the goods purchased to the customer's home. It is currently difficult to estimate the turnover generated by such services but it is supposedly very low. One reason is that, nationwide, online shopping in cybermarkets is not a widespread practice. Turnover for the AuchanDirect cybermarket, for example, is reported to be just 45% of that of any single one of the company's hypermarkets. varies across geographical space. Whereas the urban population of city centres has a diversified supply within walking distance, periurban and rural populations have to drive several kilometres to their nearest supermarket (Motte-Baumvol 2008). While this is no problem for the vast majority of the periurban population, it is more difficult for some, such as household without cars, the elderly, or families with young children. For these families home delivery, especially through online sales, may improve access to an assortment of food products by eliminating travel-related difficulties. In this context home delivery is a form of distribution that can transform the framework of analysis of the population's access to shops, especially in the outer suburbs

Decarbonising Urban Freight Transport: Experimentations in European Research Projects

One of the objectives of European research programs is to decarbonize freight transport while maintaining its competitiveness and economic strength, reduce negative externalities such as pollutant emissions, congestion and accidents, and foster innovation. Multiple initiatives have started in Europe to reach these objectives and this paper reviews some of these schemes in the field of urban freight transport. It is based mainly on 3 EC-funded projects (BESTFACT (2016), SOLUTION (2015) and SMARTFUSION (2016)). These 3 projects are either testing (Smartfusion) or examining and disseminating European ‘new solutions’ or ‘best practices’ in freight transport. The paper mainly focuses on the most decarbonizing solutions