SURFLOGH

SURFLOGH shines at 54th Annual UTSG Conference

19 July 2022 - Published by Deirdre Buist
On Wednesday 6th July, the initial results of the ‘Business Models in Action’ stage of the SURFLOGH project were presented at the 54th Annual University Transport Studies Group (UTSG) conference. Dr Jonathan Cowie, from Edinburgh Napier University, presented to a knowledgeable audience at the university’s Craiglockhart Campus. During this three-day event, over 80 delegates enjoyed not only exceptional Edinburgh sun, but also some exceptional talks. Another opportunity for SURFLOGH to shine!

Policy & pilots  

Dr Cowie is a lecturer in Transport Economics and programme leader of the MSc in Transport Planning and Engineering at Napier and has considerable experience of  research methods.

His presentation gave an overview of the SURFLOGH methodology  - ‘research in action’ -  and then outlined the aim of the studies, namely to establish the potential relationship between the prevailing policy framework and  the success of pilots in each of the five SURFLOGH partner cities/provinces.

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Dr Jonathan Cowie presents SURFLOGH's Research in Action

Assessing success

"The policy framework was assessed by applying Kiba Janaik’s (2017) idea of urban freight transport (UFT) policy maturity, " Jonathan explained.  "This enables any city’s policy framework to be mapped onto one of five levels of hierarchical UFT policy maturity, ranging from low to high.  On the other hand, the ‘success’ of pilots was established through a Delphi panel workshop held during the last SURFLOGH meeting in Groningen, immediately followed by face-to-face interviews with each of the project partners."

Insightful comparisons

The presentation was very well received, with subsequent discussions surrounding the extent to which the longevity of the pilot projects had an impact on their success. There were also some interesting  insights and comparisons drawn with the Novelog project, an earlier EU Horizon 2020 project in which SURFLOGH partner the City of Mechelen had been a major participant. 

Coming soon

While next year’s UTSG conference is planned to be held at Cardiff University in Wales, the full results of the SURFLOGH research are coming soon and will shortly be published on this website.

 

So watch out for  “Business Models in Action: Policy Frameworks and Interventions’.