“We’re a growing city, so as we get denser, the congestion increases,” said Scott Kubly, Seattle’s transportation director. “There’s been so much change in the last 10 years in how goods move and how people shop that it’s really creating a level of urgency around this.”

About 170,000 truck trips are taken on the city’s road network every day, according to city officials.

“We’ve had this concentrated population growth in urban areas at the same time that people have been doing an increasing percentage of their shopping online,” and getting more goods delivered to their home, said Anne Goodchild, the UW professor of civil and environmental engineering who directs the Supply Chain Transportation and Logistics Center. “This has made urban delivery a more pressing problem.”

Driver Jim Jackola, who delivers to bars and restaurants in Seattle, said he often must double park or park in the street’s center-turn lane when he can’t find curb parking in certain dense neighborhoods. He’d like the city to consider designating curb parking solely for freight deliveries.

“It’s more and more challenging,” Jackola said.

Meanwhile, companies are trying out their own strategies to improve urban delivery.