Bus rapid distribution
Short description
This project, is a proposal for an unconventional parcel distribution to increase sustainability and attractiveness of cities today. The proposal is built around the options that multi-modal transport and small vehicles can add to cities for less congestion and emission. The idea is based on a mobile-warehouse, e.g. a bus, circulating the city, while a team of people using ultra light vehicles, like bikes or segways, link to it and distribute the last mile.
Today, a large share of congestion and emission is attributed to light goods vehicles like carrier vans. With our proposal, emissions will roughly reduce by 70-90 percent and freight related congestion by notable amounts; there will be less light goods vehicles driving within the cities and less fuel consumed.
There are several private and public actors involved in parcel distributions in cities which will be affected by such an operational change. While citizens and the city receive the most benefit from the change, the distributors may also save up to 30 percent to their total costs today (i.e. e.g. fuel, vehicle, personnel). The partnered actors, however, have different incentives and goals, which affects their relationships, the acceptance, execution, and thus, the success of the proposal. Identification of all the potential stakeholders, their goals, concerns and partnering with the key actors for joint solutions are an integral part of this project.
This UDI-A project will explore the potentials, investigate applicability, possible barriers and challenges of the idea together with the partners, and before the subsequent demonstration.
Researcher
Niklas Arvidsson, business administration