A review on transportation last-mile network design and urban freight vehicles

Last mile logistics also referred as city logistics or urban logistics, concerns to the optimization of urban freight transportation systems. This relatively recent concept responds to the need for feasible and sustainable last mile logistics solutions that contribute to reductions on not only costs but on congestion and environmental effects, particularly in dense cities. Decisions on a supply level involve network design, which includes urban facilities location. In this context facilities are called urban or city distribution centers, micro distribution centers, satellites platforms or just satellites. On other hand, vehicle fleet related decisions need to be also customized to this particular urban distribution context, specifically dealing with multi-mode selection, fleet size, smaller vehicle capacities (i.e. city-freighters), power technology, vehicle autonomy, and inclusive, vehicle design, etc. Literature suggests there is still an opportunity in terms of optimization modeling and methodologies to address these issues. This work revises the drivers motivating the topic, the last mile distribution network elements, and establishes an explicit connection between urban network design and the actual development and use of more environmental and suitable vehicles for urban freight.