Delivery Process for an Office Building in the Seattle Central Business District

Movement of goods within a central business district can be very constraining with high levels of congestion and insufficient curb spaces. Pick-up and delivery activities encompass a significant portion of urban goods movement, and inefficient operations can negatively impact the already highly congested areas and truck dwell times. Identifying and quantifying the delivery processes within the building is often difficult. This paper introduces a systematic approach to examine freight movement, using a process flow map with quantitative delivery times measured during the final segment of the delivery process. This paper focuses on vertical movements such as unloading/loading activities, taking freight elevators, and performing pick-up/delivery operations. This approach allows visualization of the components of the delivery process and identification of the processes that consume the most time and have greatest variability. Using this method, the delivery process for an office building in downtown Seattle was observed, grouped into three major activities (or steps): 1. Entering, 2. Delivering, 3. Exiting. This visualization tool provides researchers and planners with a better understanding of the current practices in the urban freight system, and helps identify the non-value-added activities and time that can unnecessarily increase the overall delivery time.