Cities are testing new systems to reduce the pollution and congestion caused by of the final leg of a package’s journey from warehouse to doorstep
Tracey LindemanMon 4 Nov 2019 12.40 GMT
The cube truck sidled up to a row of parked cars on a busy Montreal street and threw on its hazard lights, blocking a lane of traffic. The driver hopped out with a package in hand and disappeared into a building, leaving a bottleneck of frustrated drivers in his wake.“This is exactly what we’re trying to change,” said Agathe Besse-Bergier, a project coordinator with the city, as she watched the scene unfold.
Most delivery trucks worldwide make at least 100 such brief stops a day, causing congestion, air pollution and expensive traffic delays.
It’s a delivery problem known as the “last mile” – the final leg of a package’s journey from distribution warehouse to doorstep – and it has become a bigger problem with the growth of online shopping, particularly same-day and next-day delivery. To meet these short delivery windows, more trucks must be driven into busy city centres, often at the height of rush hour.
“Sometimes those big trucks leave the warehouse full, sometimes half-empty,” said Victor Char, a consultant with Jalon Montréal, an organisation founded by the city to find urban mobility solutions. “Trucks leave the warehouse one, two, three times a day, just to go around and make sure the package is delivered on that date.”
Jalon Montréal thinks it has a solution: Colibri is a pilot system in which hubs are set up in the city to receive packages, which are then distributed using special electric cargo bikes.
The word “Colibri” is a portmanteau of colis and livraison, the French words for “package” and “delivery”, and also the word for hummingbird – an apt moniker, said city councillor Robert Beaudry: the city hopes to create a network of small delivery “nests” throughout the city to replace giant suburban warehouses.
Can ‘nests’ and eco bikes reduce the environmental impact of parcel delivery in cities? | The Guardian
Cities are testing new systems to reduce the pollution and congestion caused by of the final leg of a package’s journey from warehouse to doorstep Tracey LindemanMon 4 Nov 2019 12.40 GMT The cube truck sidled up to a row of parked cars on a busy Montreal street and threw on its hazard lights, blocking… [Read More]