express carriers. The Italian legal system is significantly different to UK law. However, a key feature of the Vicenza case is that the appeal court ruled that the decision to restrict traffic in a historic centre cannot be annulled based on the accusation it limits free competition. Vicenza is a relatively small town with a city centre that has UNESCO world heritage status. As such it is likely that the ZTL would only have minimal effects on competition. The same conclusion may not have been reached in a city without world heritage status, or where the ZTL extended over a larger area.
The local government of Utrecht took, in summary, the following actions:
allowing three existing distribution centres of private carriers to operate as Urban Distribution Centres (UDCs);
funding the 'Cargohopper', an electric vehicle, owned by a private company. It is unclear how this was legally implemented and what, if any, legal privileges it enjoys.
Operators of UDCs benefit from:
an exemption during certain time windows from a prohibition of entry of vehicles to the city centre's pedestrianised zone up to a maximum of five vehicles at a time; and
○ access to selected bus lanes up to a maximum of five vehicles at a time.
Any carrier can operate a UDC provided it meets the following requirements:
it makes collections and/or deliveries from/to 100 addresses per day in the city centre;
it has a distribution centre within 10km of the city centre and 5km of the city's motorway exit;
its vehicles meet certain emission standards;
it agrees to accept third parties' goods for delivery/collection in the city centre; and
it completes a monitoring form twice a year.
Potentially the Utrecht model could be implemented in England via the use of TROs restricting the delivery of goods within a certain area to those carriers who operate a UDC. The Utrecht approach does not compel delivery to and collection from CUCCs, but instead leaves delivery companies that do not do so disadvantaged. It is beyond the scope of this review to comment on why Utrecht determined that three UDCs should be permitted, but one possible reason is that there only were three existing distribution centres and therefore the approach taken by the authority simply enhanced the status quo.
Under the Swedish model the public sector is encouraged to procure goods separate from logistics. Existing procurement legislation in England and Wales would permit the public sector to procure goods in this way, or alternatively to require delivery to a CUCC. This could be made a requirement within public sector procurement through the issue of a procurement policy note. However, in order to comply with such directions, it is likely that funding would also need to be made available to the relevant public sector bodies.
Depending on how the CUCC is operated and funded, there could be implications under the Subsidy Control Act 2022, as the provision of goods or services or any transfer of funds could constitute a subsidy (for example, if the entity receiving the benefit of the CUCC were the distributor due to reduced logistics costs).
To the extent any subsidy was given, it would need to take account of the principles in the Subsidy Control Act 2022, and it would, among other things, need to be shown that the subsidy was proportionate to and necessary for the policy objective it wished to meet and the least distortive means of achieving that objective.
Any challenge would be dependent upon its own particular facts, for example in Vicenza the carriers argued that in order to provide express postal services, a carrier must be considered a 'regulated agent', which required a degree of training, and that while the carriers were qualified, Veloce was not, meaning Veloce was conducting business illegally. Therefore, this review does not attempt to set out all potential routes of challenge, but rather highlight the more obvious potential pitfalls.