Hybrid Simulation of Textile Waste Collection in the city of Parma: Modelling citizen behaviour and system logistics and policy incentives

This paper presents a hybrid simulation model to analyse and design innovative systems for urban textile-waste collection, using the city of Parma (Italy) as a case study. Building on and extending a prior framework, the paper tackles a common limitation in the literature: many agent-based applications rely on static, passive agents, which constrains the method's explanatory power. Here, instead, citizens are active and adaptive agents, whose behaviour evolves with perceived service quality, neighbourhood practices, and incentive schemes set by the collection manager. The model couples a realistic urban network, multiple collection routes, and heterogeneous citizen archetypes, and produces multidimensional outputs spanning service-level performance and environmental impacts. It also accounts for behaviour change, showing how word-of-mouth and incentives shape collective sustainability outcomes. The results provide actionable guidance for both infrastructure design and behaviour-oriented policies, supporting the transition toward circular textile systems. Ultimately, the work offers a reproducible, extensible decision-support tool for urban planners and policymakers confronting sustainable waste-management challenges.