Trucks travel both short distances for local deliveries and long distances for transporting goods across the country. Often their travel behavior is tour-based, they run under tight schedules and under curfew on selected roads. Despite these differences from personal travel, in practice truck models largely follow person travel methods. To overcome this shortcoming, a two-layer truck model is developed for the Chicago Metropolitan Area. Long- distance trucks are driven by commodity flows, with distribution centers, rail yards, marine ports and airports being represented explicitly. Empty trucks are accounted for as well. For the short- distance truck model, a novel parameter estimation method makes use of limited data to derive region-specific parameters. The model is fully operational and validates reasonably well against traffic counts.     «

Trucks travel both short distances for local deliveries and long distances for transporting goods across the country. Often their travel behavior is tour-based, they run under tight schedules and under curfew on selected roads. Despite these differences from personal travel, in practice truck models largely follow person travel methods. To overcome this shortcoming, a two-layer truck model is developed for the Chicago Metropolitan Area. Long- distance trucks are driven by commodity flows, with d...     »