BACKGROUND
E-commerce (electronic commerce) generally refers to the buying and selling of goods and services over an electronic network, primarily the Internet. These transactions occur either as business-to-business (B2B), business-to-consumer (B2C), consumer-to-consumer, or consumer-to-business. Although e-commerce has long been a part of the commercial and freight distribution landscapes, the COVID-19 pandemic prompted considerable growth in e-commerce, affecting the business models of numerous commercial establishments as well as delivery and other service industries. Advanced communications and delivery technologies improved the convenience of e-commerce to shoppers, attracting new customers and developing strong consumer bases. Even as the pandemic has run its course, e-commerce remains a principal means of distributing goods to markets and consumers.
The growth of e-commerce has transformed land use and transportation in settings ranging from small communities and rural areas to suburban areas and cities. Research is needed to fully comprehend the qualitative and quantitative effects of e-commerce to effectively integrate e-commerce into transportation and land use policy and investment decision-making. The research will be useful to transportation and land use planners and practitioners, but also will provide useful information for executive leadership, elected officials, and the general public.
OBJECTIVE
The objective of this research is to develop a guide on the effects of e-commerce on transportation and land use, including the impacts on transportation systems and freight delivery as well as on the communities and land uses that support them. The guide shall provide practical strategies, methods, and techniques on how to measure and project the effects of e-commerce on transportation and land use, and how to incorporate e-commerce into transportation analysis and decision-making processes and functions.
The guide shall address three major categories of inquiry:
1. What is the definition of e-commerce? Define e-commerce from transportation, freight planning and operations, urban planning, and land use perspectives.
2. What are the impacts of e-commerce on transportation and land use? Identify the direct and indirect effects of e-commerce on transportation and land use policy, processes, and investments in the public and private sectors to support and optimize e-commerce activity.
3. What are the policies, data, practices, and applications in use today to accommodate and support e-commerce into transportation systems and land use?
Document policies, programs, and practices in which e-commerce and direct-to-consumer activities have been incorporated into analyses, models, and land use planning. Include all modes (maritime, air cargo, rail, and trucking) in e-commerce activity, along with different varieties of land uses.
TASKS
Phase I – Planning
TASK 1 – LITERATURE REVIEW
Under Task 1, the research team will conduct a comprehensive review of the literature that describes:
· Industry profile and definition
· Impacts on transportation and land use
· Best practices for managing impacts
Methodology
The literature review will rely on online search engines, such as TRB’s, which provides citations for transportation-related research. In addition, the research team will conduct a Google search of approximately 25 MPO, city government, and state DOT websites to identify and catalog the work they have done surrounding impacts of e-commerce. The research team also has personal contacts with many transportation planning managers who will likely have a good idea of which of their peer agencies offer helpful examples.
Given the large number of books, reports, and articles that will be reviewed, a systematic approach for synthesizing this information is required. Specifically, each relevant reference will be summarized with a template of information including a citation, summary, and assigned key words. These key words will be used to search the literature based on key themes such as uncertainty and risk, uncertainty and planning, and the like.
Task 1 Deliverables:
· Literature review memo
TASK 2 – OUTREACH AND ENGAGEMENT
The research team will develop a comprehensive outreach plan that targets each of the stakeholders with different instruments, so that engagement can be maximized, and the highest quality feedback can be obtained to support guidebook development. The plan will be multi-faceted to engage different targeted groups on different issues related to e-commerce impacts on land use and transportation. The detailed outreach plan will be submitted for IRB determination in advance of implementation and shared with the panel to obtain comments on format, structure, and groups and individuals targeted for participation.
Community issues and challenges will be investigated through in-depth case studies. Interviews will be used to investigate the e-commerce, retail, transportation, and warehousing industries. A survey will be conducted of planning and transportation agencies around the country, at all levels of government, to understand their e-commerce information needs and identify relevant tools and data. This survey will be followed by agency focus groups on specific topics that delve deeper into best practices and challenges.
The components of this multifaceted outreach plan are provided in the sections below.
Agency Survey
The research team shall conduct a survey of public agencies to gain insight into their understanding of e-commerce and its impacts to gain insight into the current understanding of e-commerce operations and impacts by public agencies. The survey is expected to include multiple choice and open-ended questions. The questions and distribution list will reflect the information collected in Task 1 and ask questions about:
· The level of priority of studying e-commerce and degree of interest by constituents
· The main impacts of e-commerce in their jurisdiction
· The extent to which e-commerce is considered in planning processes
· The data sources, tools, or techniques they are using to better understand the impact of e-commerce
· The data gaps regarding e-commerce and specific information needs to support planning and policy
· The resources available (staffing and budgetary) to acquire data or conduct e-commerce analyses
· Potential interview contacts for use in other components of our outreach plan
The survey instruments and distribution will seek to have the following characteristics:
· The survey instrument will be intuitive and engaging.
· The survey distribution will be diverse and comprehensive.
The research team will seek the assistance of contacts and various industry organizations, such as AMPO, NACTO, and AASHTO to assist in the distribution of, and generating responses to, the survey. The survey questions, format, and distribution list will be shared with the panel in advance of administration for their input on survey content, format, recipients, and other administrative features.
Agency Focus Groups
Building on the survey results, the research team will plan and facilitate a series of focus groups with agency staff to discuss the current state of practice, tools being used to analyze impacts of e-commerce, concerns about e-commerce and its impacts, and access to e-commerce at the local level. The focus groups will provide a forum for gathering feedback and reactions from agencies and planning organizations in more detail than is possible in the survey.
The focus groups will be held virtually and will be comprised of 5-7 participating organizations. They will be organized topically around key issues such as travel demand modeling, data sources, local planning processes, and managing impacts (such as complete streets and last-mile best practices). Participants will be sought that are at the forefront of the topics being discussed. They will be identified through our research team’s experience and through exceptional responses received in the agency survey. The research team will seek to achieve geographic diversity and include participants from rural, suburban, and urban communities. The research team will produce a moderator’s guide for review by the NCHRP panel prior to initiation of the focus groups.
Industry Interviews
One-on-one interviews will explore e-commerce trends as well as best practices in methodologies and data sets in the private sector. Depending on the audience, the interviews may probe into details of modeling or assessment of impacts on local communities.
The research team will leverage its private sector contacts from prior freight planning and ongoing research projects conducted across the country - including manufacturing, warehouse and distribution, retail, and trucking - to identify and connect with industry stakeholders. The research team will seek to engage major retailers such as Walmart and Nordstrom who have both in-store and home delivery strategies, and organizations such as the International Council of Shopping Centers who are active in this space. Additionally, the team will seek the participation of industry contacts in the warehousing, distribution, and retailing industries. Lastly, the team will interview representatives from the trucking and transportation sectors to arrange and conduct insightful interviews about how these sectors are affected by e-commerce.
The team will develop a draft list of interview targets for review and comment by NCHRP. The list will target organizations that cover a range of geographies, sectors, modes, and sizes. The team will develop one or more interview guides with questions and prompts for review and comment by the panel. Questions may address e-commerce trends, impacts to and changes in operations and business, data and analysis tools, and management practices.
Community Case Studies
Community stakeholder interviews will be held with up to 25 representatives of community organizations identified in the literature review, survey, interviews, and the research team’s national professional experience. Up to three case studies will be developed to illustrate the impact of e-commerce on communities in a variety of contexts.
For example, a case study may focus on a specific suburban or rural community that has seen an explosion of warehousing and logistics companies, generating substantial truck traffic and repurposing of buildings into warehousing. The case study would rely on interviews with community groups and local leaders to gain a ground-level understanding of the impacts they are facing, and potential solutions. Another case study could focus on challenges in an urban context such as the community group, South Bronx Unite for a case study wherein grassroots community organizers have advocated to reduce truck traffic on local streets, improve air quality for underserved communities, and reduce curbside conflicts.
Reporting
An outreach findings memo describing methods, questions, and results will be developed. It will include a summary of themes and findings for each topic area.
Task 2 Deliverables
· Outreach Methodology Memo proposing a specific survey instrument, focus group strategy, interview questions and number and composition of targeted interviews, and case study methodology
· Survey data
· Presentation materials
· Virtual focus group plan and data summary with agencies (up to four)
· Community case study plan and documentation (up to three)
· Outreach Findings Memo summarizing results of survey, focus groups, interviews, and case studies.
· Web-based meeting with project panel to review outreach outcomes
TASK 3 – SYNTHESIS AND ASSESSMENT OF PRACTICE
The objective of Task 3 is to develop a succinct description of how transportation and planning agencies are defining, measuring, forecasting, and managing the impacts of e-commerce, to identify gaps and needs in practice.
E-commerce Impacts Framework
Building on the findings of the previous tasks, a framework will be developed to help identify, categorize, and prioritize the impacts from e-commerce on transportation and land use. The objective of the framework is to articulate a common understanding of which impacts should be considered in the guidebook development. The framework will ultimately serve to provide practitioners and planners a quick way to conceptualize the wide-ranging impacts of e-commerce and determine which should be considered in their local studies or plans. The framework will consider:
· A wide range of community impacts from transportation and land use, including safety, air quality pollution, emissions of greenhouse gases, noise, congestion, roadway deterioration, housing costs, etc.
· The economic opportunities, jobs, and access to retail goods and product choice enabled by e-commerce.
· Incidence and equity of the impacts, including the degree to which it affects different communities, businesses (retail and transportation), agencies, and other stakeholders.
· The dynamic relationship between transportation, e-commerce service requirements and land-use decisions.
· The time horizon of the impacts, including classification by first-order and second-order (direct and indirect).
· Categorization of impacts by level of priority (high, medium, and low) in guidebook development.
· Frameworks must be scalable, flexible for use in different contexts, sensitive to the level of resources (financial, personnel, and technical) needed to implement the recommended process, and adaptive to any changing requirements of the institutional environment.
State of Practice Synthesis
The state of practice of planning and transportation agencies will be evaluated along four dimensions:
· E-commerce Impacts Definition: How is e-commerce defined? Which impacts are considered?
· E-commerce Impacts Measurement: What fraction and types of agencies attempt to measure e-commerce impacts? How accurately and thoroughly are agencies able to quantify the impacts in their jurisdiction? What costs have agencies incurred in measuring impacts?
· E-commerce Impacts Modeling and Forecasting: Which agencies have attempted to forecast e-commerce impacts? How have agencies integrated e-commerce trends into travel demand models? Do agencies have travel demand models and how well do they incorporate urban logistics and e-commerce?
· E-commerce Impacts Management: What strategies are agencies implementing to manage the impacts of e-commerce? How are these strategies developed? What information or data is used to tailor these strategies to local conditions?
Needs and Gaps Assessment
The Task 2 outreach will seek to generate the information and data needs of agencies to support planning and policy decision-making regarding e-commerce. These responses, combined with the understanding of the community and industry challenges summarized in the E-commerce Impacts Framework, will facilitate the identification of gaps in the state of practice. The team will match appropriate methodologies identified through earlier research tasks with the gaps in the state of practice, to outline and formulate the main components of the guidebook to ensure that the guidebook addresses the most pressing gaps in practice and provides needed information to agencies regarding e-commerce. This assessment, and the recommendations for guidebook development, will be summarized in the Synthesis and Assessment of Practice Memo.
Task 3 Deliverables
· Synthesis and Assessment of Practice Memo
TASK 4 – PHASE II WORK PLAN DEVELOPMENT
In Task 4 the research team will develop a Phase II Work Plan that is informed by the findings of the previous tasks, particularly the results of the outreach and the synthesis of practice. This work plan will contain an annotated outline of the content of the Transportation and Land Use Impacts of E-commerce Guidebook, including a description of its format, target length, and sample use of graphics.
The Phase II Work Plan will also identify new project activities or products that could strengthen the content of the guidebook and facilitate its adoption throughout planning practice (with panel approval):
· New project activities could include, for example, conducting a targeted survey of community impacts, conducting a second-round agency survey, or developing a meta-analysis of published results.
· New research products could include a series of graphic-oriented technical briefs designed to be easily consumed by practitioners and executives, or a series of one-page summaries of instructive case-studies.
· The research team will develop an Impact Estimation Toolkit that will provide practitioners clear steps, rules, and formulas for developing a sketch approximation of e-commerce impacts.
The project panel will review the Phase II Work Plan and provide feedback to the research team. A more in-depth discussion of the Work Plan and additional products will occur in the interim, in-person meeting.
Task 4 Deliverables
· Phase II Work Plan
· Outline of Transportation and Land Use Impacts of E-commerce Guidebook
TASK 5 – INTERIM REPORT
Task 5 will develop an interim report that provides a detailed description of the research process and results of Tasks 1, 2, and 3. The report will summarize conclusions drawn from the literature review, the stakeholder outreach, and the practice synthesis. The interim report will also summarize the results of the needs and gaps analysis conducted as part of Task 3. Some of these gaps will be addressed in the Phase II Work Plan, while others are likely to require more extensive investigation and data collection as part of future studies. The interim report will be written in a way that is accessible to agency and other stakeholders, so that content can be used for the guidebook or final report, as appropriate. This task includes one review by the project panel. Panel feedback will be incorporated into the document and carried though to subsequent research products.
Following the development of the interim report, the research team will develop materials to support an interim, in-person meeting with the project panel to review the interim report and the Phase II Work Plan. The meeting will serve as a mid-course progress report opportunity and a forum to discuss the panel’s desired direction of the Phase II Work Plan. The project panel will provide input on the status of the research project and suggestions for the final deliverables. The WSP research team will plan a facilitated discussion to capture the panel’s thoughts about the completed research, the identified gaps in knowledge and practice, and opinions about the most impactful ways to implement the Phase II Work Plan.
Task 5 Deliverables:
· Interim report summarizing the research from Tasks 1, 2, and 3
· Interim meeting presentation materials
· Interim in-person or virtual meeting to review the interim report and Phase II Work Plan
Phase II – Development and Validation of Research Products
TASK 6 – GUIDEBOOK DEVELOPMENT AND FIELD TESTING
Task 6 will develop elements of the guidebook to a draft level sufficient for input and testing “for their usefulness in the field” via several virtual workshops with planning and transportation agencies.
The research team anticipates developing a succinct and graphically appealing guidebook that focuses entirely on maximizing interest and receptivity by the intended audience. The guidebook will provide essential context on e-commerce and its impacts to travel and land use, and will focus on presenting specific methods and resources that practitioners are able to employ in varying contexts. The guidebook will present sidebar case studies to showcase the application of the approaches and highlight places where strategies have been effective at managing e-commerce impacts.
Guidebook Storyboard Presentation
To ensure that the guidebook covers the right content, at a useful level a detail, a Guidebook Storyboard Presentation will be developed based on the approved outline. This PowerPoint presentation will contain all the elements of the guidebook, organized in the same structure as they are intended to be included in the guidebook, so that the content can be field tested by practitioners. This approach is preferable to field testing a full draft of the guidebook because: (1) it will be easier for busy practitioners to provide feedback on all the content of the guidebook, (2) it will be more efficient for the research team to draft a guidebook incorporating stakeholder feedback than having to rewrite a draft if substantial feedback is received, and (3) it will help with the organization of concepts and telling of a consistent story.
The Guidebook Storyboard Presentation will be submitted to the panel for review before field testing.
Impacts Estimation Toolkit
The Guidebook Storyboard Presentation will contain all the elements of the proposed Impacts Estimation Toolkit. This toolkit uses published results and data to provide a planning-level estimate that is immediately useful to transportation and planning agencies. The toolkit, which will ultimately be contained in one of the chapters of the guidebook, will provide specific equations and relationships for estimating the amount and size of packages delivered to households of different characteristics (e.g., income, size, car dependency, etc.), as shown in Figure 5. This delivery demand will then be translated into aggregate truck miles traveled and passenger vehicle miles traveled using substitution patterns from the academic literature, and data on truck and passenger vehicle trip and tour formation (averages and distribution). Specific guidance will also be provided to estimate the various community impacts of these vehicle miles of travel (e.g., safety, air quality, greenhouse gas emissions, congestion, etc.), and to forecast or model these impacts as a function of demographics, e-commerce demand generation, vehicle assumptions, etc. Results of the toolkit will be provided in ranges, factoring the elasticities, uncertainties, and substitution patterns observed in the literature.
This toolkit is not intended to quantify all the impacts of e-commerce, instead it focuses on a few of the impacts that are shown to be of greatest interest to agencies around the country as determined through the research conducted thus far with the intent of maximizing its impact on the industry. Other chapters of the guidebook will provide recommendations for how to estimate other types of impacts, such as but not limited to the impacts to other modes, land use, equity, and economic opportunities, and will provide recommendations for estimating the impacts covered in the toolkit with higher accuracy based on local analysis and data sources.
Field Testing
The Guidebook Storyboard Presentation will be field tested by public agency practitioners to assess how well it fits in with their existing practices, systems, and procedures as well as expectations for improving these existing practices. Testing will take place first by organizing and holding a series of virtual workshops organized with the Association of Metropolitan Planning Organizations (AMPO) and a potentially in a Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) sponsored Talking Freight seminar. A third virtual workshop or peer exchange could be held with the American Planning Association (APA) or other national group of planning professionals. The location, participants, and content of the workshops or peer exchanges will be developed in consultation with the project panel. They will be used to introduce the guidebook materials and receive initial feedback on content and format. The facilitated discussions will emphasize the following questions:
Are the key concepts and applications of the technical material effectively described?
· What material and topics are missing?
· Will the material as presented likely be used in a typical agency?
· Are the guidebook/technical materials formatted in an easy-to-use and understandable manner?
· If there is one part of the guidebook/technical material you could change, what would it be?
· Input provided will be consolidated in a comment log showing originator, topic area, and recommended action.
During the workshops we will solicit agencies who wish to volunteer for more detailed review and testing of the draft guidebook developed in Task 7. Agencies will be given a set period of time (such as a month) to implement the guidebook elements and then provide feedback in writing.
Task 6 Deliverables
· Guidebook Storyboard Presentation
· Three field testing workshops
· Comment log
TASK 7 – GUIDEBOOK REFINEMENT
The research team will provide recommendations for how to address each of the stakeholder input in the comment log generated as part of Task 6. These recommendations will be shared with the panel and feedback will be incorporated. A virtual meeting will be scheduled to discuss stakeholder input that is challenging to address and achieve a consensus.
Draft Guidebook
The research team will implement the consensus recommendations and develop a draft guidebook based on the Storybook presentation. This draft will be formatted as the final draft, including all figures, graphics, and exhibits. The final draft will be delivered to the panel for review and feedback.
The layout of the guidebook sections will feature visual cues that support wayfinding, readability, and usability. Infographics, tables, charts, and diagrams will also be included to facilitate information comprehension. The guidebook will be available as a downloadable, printable PDF with an auto-generated, linked table of contents, section cross-linking, and hyperlinks to external resources.
The draft guidebook will be submitted to the panel for a minimum 30-day review to provide their comments and input.
Task 7 Deliverables
· Draft Transportation and Land Use Impacts of E-commerce Guidebook and Toolkit
TASK 8 – FINAL RESEARCH PRODUCTS
The primary deliverable of this project will be the Transportation and Land Use Impacts of E-commerce Guidebook. The guide will provide a framework, cite resources, and make recommendations for methodologies that can be useful to public agencies. This guidebook will contain the Impacts Estimation Toolkit, which will allow users to quickly develop approximate estimates for the impacts of e-commerce. Comments from the panel on the draft guidebook will be addressed to prepare a final guidebook product.
The guidebook will be supplemented by the following deliverables in accordance with NCHRP project requirements:
· A Conduct of Research Report that documents research efforts and provides details about the approach, outreach findings, and literature review complementing the information provided in the guide.
· An implementation plan that considers dissemination and application of the guide and other research products, audience/users, any challenges to overcome, and institutions and individuals who can take a leadership role in championing the research products.
· Presentation materials summarizing project findings.
We will revise the draft versions of the final deliverables to respond to panel’s comments. This process will take place during the final three months of the research timeframe.
Task 8 Deliverables
· Final Transportation and Land Use Impacts of E-commerce Guidebook and Toolkit
· Final Conduct of Research Report
· Final Implementation of Research Findings and Products Plan
· Final Presentation materials
The final deliverables will include the final guide and (1) a Conduct of Research report that summarizes the research approach; (2) an Implementation Plan that sets forth a specific strategy for generating applications of the research in practice; and (3) any additional products identified in the approved Phase II work plan.
STATUS: Project is in Phase II and expected to be completed on time.
