A general model for predicting the environmental impact of urban transportation

In this paper a generalised model is described for the analysis of the pollutant substances released in the atmosphere by urban transportation means. It essentially requires data referring to the running transportation fleet, year by year, that are generally on disposal of the local administrators through official data-bases. Pollutant emissions are here taken into account by means of the algorithms provided by the COPERT methodology, that applies to many European countries. The method, by means of a suitable statistical analysis of data concerning the running car fleet, allows also the definition of an useful indicator, that is the “yearly average vehicle”, that can be assumed as representative of the average pollutant emissions of a given urban context. This indicator can be adopted for suitably ranking the environmental effects produced by different policy options concerning the transportation sector.