Introduction

Abstract

Transport is an important part of our everyday life and, in consequence, a large and expanding literature has grown up over the years on various aspects of transport and movement. Interest among academic economists and those concerned with theoretical questions of transport management would seem to be almost entirely in the field of person movement if this literature is to be taken as a guide. Many books have appeared concerned with devising criteria to enable public passenger transport to offer more efficient services while others proffer solutions to the ever-increasing problem of accommodating the continuously expanding private car fleet. Where freight transport has been considered, attention has focused on longer-distance movements (by rail or ship) or on the economic and operational problems of a specific sector (e.g. freightliners or public road haulage). This book is concerned with a somewhat neglected sub-field in transport, namely urban freight transport.¹