RCE Peel - 2023

Pilot Off-Peak Delivery (OPD) Program in Peel Region
Basic Information
Title of project : 
Pilot Off-Peak Delivery (OPD) Program in Peel Region
Submitting RCE: 
RCE Peel
Contributing organization(s) : 
Peel Region, Smart Freight Centre, University of Toronto
Focal point(s) and affiliation(s)
Name: 
Sabrina Khan
Organizational Affiliation: 
Peel Region
Format of project: 
Report
Language of project: 
English
Date of submission:
Thursday, January 30, 2020
Peel Region’s Goods Movement Strategic Plan (2017-2021) – Action Item #3: Increase Capacity with Convenient and Feasible Off-Peak Deliveries
At what level is the policy operating?: 
Local
Geographical & Education Information
Region: 
Americas
Country: 
Canada
Location(s): 
Peel region
Ecosystem(s):
Target Audience:
Socioeconomic and environmental characteristics of the area : 
Peel region is a significant freight hub for Canada and a strategic location for national distribution. An estimated $1.8 billion worth of commodities travel to, from, and through Peel every day making goods movement a pillar of the regional economy.
Potential benefits of off-peak delivery include societal benefits to residents, as well as operational benefits to businesses. Both are important goals for the residents of Peel, since efficient goods delivery improves the health of the regional economy, which leads to jobs and less expensive consumer products.
Description of sustainable development challenge(s) in the area the project addresses: 
Off-peak deliveries help address the following challenges:
• Reduce congestion during the day-time hours when traffic congestion is the greatest
• Removing truck traffic during congested periods frees up roadway capacity during the day and potentially reduces travel times for commuters, including those using transit modes that operate in mixed traffic
• Reduction of truck travel during the daytime also reduces air quality pollutants emitted at that time
• Reductions in truck idling and slower travel speeds in congestion are also expected to reduce the total emissions for the same number of deliveries
• Reduced interactions between trucks, and vulnerable primarily daytime road users such as pedestrians and cyclists also have potential for improvement in road safety
Contents
Status: 
Completed
Period: 
February, 2019 to August, 2019
Rationale: 
The purpose of this project is to initiate an OPD pilot in Peel Region. Lessons learned during this pilot will encourage the long-term goal of implementing a full time OPD program in Peel in the future. Focus is placed on deliveries to areas in Peel where OPD is feasible and beneficial for participating firms. In contrast to other previously implemented OPD projects, this pilot focuses on deliveries in suburban areas. Lessons from the pilot are intended to inform how the Peel Region and, more broadly, municipalities across the Greater Toronto and Hamilton Area can enable OPD.

The desired outcomes are:
1) To reduce traffic congestion on corridors with high truck traffic volumes
2) To provide firms and municipalities with a strategy to mitigate congestion, and improve goods movement efficiency
3) To take lessons learned from the pilot to inform the scalability of OPD in Peel Region and in the Greater Toronto and Hamilton Area in the long term
Objectives: 
The objectives of this pilot project are as follows:
• Identify and recruit firms that are interested in participating in the OPD pilot
• Collaborate with participating firms to identify challenges to pilot OPD, develop strategies to respond to the challenges, and design customized business plans
• Implement the OPD pilot to the selected stores from each participating business
• Measure performance of OPD
• Collect lessons learned for region-wide implementation of OPD
Activities and/or practices employed: 
Three firms participated in the off-peak delivery program over a six-month period from February 25 to August 31, 2019. These firms were recruited by MRK Innovations and Partners in Project Green and included LCBO, Loblaw Incorporated and Walmart Canada. The three firms shifted delivery times at a total of 14 participating retail stores. The retail stores were selected, in collaboration with each firm and Peel Region, based on their proximity to residential areas, (selecting locations with lower potential neighbourhood impacts) and the expected operational benefits. The selected retail stores are shown in Figure 1. For the three firms, two distribution centres are located in Peel region, one is located in London, Ontario and one in Cambridge, Ontario. The local municipalities in Peel, which include the Cities of Brampton, Mississauga, and the Town of Caledon, provided a blanket exemption from the noise by-laws to allow deliveries to be made in the evening for the duration of the pilot program.
Results: 
Overall, during the pilot, 1,599 stops at participating retail stores were made in the off-peak hours, which represented 30.1% of total stops to those stores. In the off-peak period, average speed improved by 18.1%, emissions reduced by 10.6% to 15.0%, average service time increased by 11 minutes, and no noise complaints were submitted.
Lessons learned: 
Post-pilot interviews were conducted with the logistics managers from LCBO, Loblaw Incorporated and Walmart Canada that were most familiar with the OPD pilot. The purpose of the interviews was to learn about challenges, successes, and ways that the pilot program could be improved.

Interviews with logistics managers identified that some delivery activities took longer for one company in the off-peak hours, in part because there was potentially busier staff at that time of day.
Key messages: 
Off-peak delivery (OPD) is the delivery of goods during the evening and overnight hours. This strategy has the potential to alleviate congestion during peak periods and increase utilization of existing transportation infrastructure capacity. It can also offer greater efficiency to delivery firms by potentially reducing costs for the shippers and the receivers.
Relationship to other RCE activities: 
The OPD pilot addresses Action Item #3 of the Goods Movement Strategic Plan 2017-2021. RCE Peel has promoted the Off-Peak Delivery Program through Peel’s Goods Movement Task Force and Smart Freight Centre committees.
Funding: 
This study was funded by Peel Region, The Atmospheric Fund, Metrolinx, and the University of Toronto. The contributions of MRK Innovations, Partners in Project Green and Deloitte Canada are acknowledged. LCBO, Loblaw Incorporated, and Walmart Canada participated in the OPD pilot program.
UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)
(https://sustainabledevelopment.un.org/sdgs) and other themes of Education for Sustainable Development (ESD)
SDG 3 - Ensure healthy lives and promote wellbeing for all at all ages 
Indirect
SDG 8 - Promote sustained, inclusive and sustainable economic growth, full and productive employment, and decent work for all 
Direct
SDG 9 - Build resilient infrastructure, promote inclusive and sustainable industrialisation, and foster innovation 
Direct
SDG 11 - Make cities and human settlements inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable 
Direct
SDG 13 - Take urgent action to combat climate change and its impacts 
Direct
Theme
Forests/Trees 
Indirect
Plants & Animals 
Indirect
Waste 
Indirect
ESD for 2030-Priority Action Areas
Priority Action Area 1 - Advancing policy 
state: 
Direct
Priority Action Area 2 - Transforming learning and training environments 
state: 
Indirect
Priority Action Area 5 - Accelerating sustainable solutions at local level 
state: 
Direct
Update: 
No
I acknowledge the above: 
Yes