The current configuration of freight distribution systems in urban areas is reaching unsustainable levels of negative impact on quality of life andeconomic efficiency. In the TADIRAM project ("Advanced Technologies and Innovative Sw Tools for Freight Distribution in the Sustainable City"), co-funded by the Italian Ministry of Research and Universities and the Consortium TRAIN, recently closed, research activities have been carried out aimed at identifying new organizational and technological solutions for the optimization of freight distribution process, to improve the quality and the efficiency of logistic services in urban areas and to contribute to the sustainability in terms of traffic and air pollution. Train is a consortium for RTD on INnovative TRAnsport, it is a no-profit organization promotedby ENEA - Italian National Agency on New Technologies, Energy and Environment. The partners involved in Tadiram are: Ansaldobreda, Bertolotti, D'Appolonia, ENEA (ENETEC and BIOTEC department) and Uniontrasporti. The Tadiram Project has studied and designed all the elements of a new organizationof delivery based on logistic bases and transit-points. The Tadiram City Logistics concept is that freight hubs are established in a suburban areasfor receiving goods coming from outside and distributing them in the inner town using ecological transport vehicles (road and rail) and optimising the delivery tours. The "last mile" service can be operated either by single private operators or operators cooperative or public/private partnerships. The location sites are defined on the basis of town configuration and the freight hubs are equipped with a computerized control center (CCC) both for communications and elaborations. The Tadiram partners have developedan IT system to manage delivery orders coming from hubs customers (haulage operators); this system allows to filter demand and to easy delivery optimisation, even though the hubs operational scheme provides also the possibility of using the "last mile" service" without any previous announcement. In Tadiram, a new version of SIRIO Cargo Tram (AnsaldoBreda) has been studied. According to the TADIRAM results, cargo tram is particularly suitable for fruits and vegetables distribution from general market to local markets, in the first morning, when passenger traffic is low and tram tracks can be easier occupied by freight vehicles; another possible application of cargo tram is hospitals goods supplying by night; more generally, cargo tram can be usefully used when big amounts of goods have a unique origin or a unique destination. The new load units have been designed and realisedas demonstrators by TRAIN partners; they are two types: one to carry pallets and the other one to carry small load units o single parcels, also to be delivered to different destinations. An innovative equipment for load units handling - carried out within the TADIRAM project - allows a semi-automatic loading and unloading of tram and lorries and helps short trips as well. At the conclusion of the project, a study of application of the innovative logistic schema in an Italian southern town (Cosenza ) is be carried out and technological and computing prototypes are been tested. The goalof the TADIRAM project has been basically the demonstration of the feasibility of the new distribution scheme at a multi-level framework i.e. at technological level, at operative and operation management level, at users level, at administration and sociality level, at economical level. These results will constitute the necessary basis for implementing in real contexts operative systems in their final complete configuration and for establishing a permanent staff to perform the service. For the covering abstract see ITRD E135582.
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