A new and unique last-mile delivery experiment is set to tested out in eight U.S. cities including Miami, Minneapolis, Los Angeles, Philadelphia, Portland, San Francisco, San Jose, and Seattle.
Key Takeaways:
- Cargo freight bicycles will be tested out very soon, in a variety of U.S. cities to gather information on how to continue to be innovative when it comes to last-mile deliveries.
- Open Mobility Foundation will be leading the project which will allow these cargo bicycles to support 500-1,000 pounds of freight.
- Miami and the seven other cities will collaborate and collect data during this experiment to better understand their learnings.
What Does This Last-Mile Delivery Experiment Entail?
Open Mobility Foundation is the driving force behind this project. As Transport Topics details, Open Mobility is an open-source software foundation whose Mobility Data Specification digital platform provides high-tech communications between cities and users of public streets to improve soft.
This trial, which is set to begin soon, would last for eighteen months, and would help improve and revolutionize last-mile deliveries in downtown areas by using digital infrastructure for smart parking combined with electric pedicap-like cargo freight bikes.
Additionally, these bikes would be able to have a back area that would support 500 to 1,000 pounds of freight.
“It’s not insignificant in terms of the amount of freight that can be carried on these vehicles,” Eulois Cleckley, Director and CEO of the Miami-Dade County Department of Transportation and Public Works stated.
In Miami, DTPW is planning on using a model where parcels are offloaded in warehouses or other sites located out of congest areas, and then onto the cargo bikes.
The eight cities partaking in this trial will collaborate with each other, including the data they collect during the 18-month experiment. The data collected will be on a variety of things including truck reductions, the number of vehicles needed for deliveries, and emissions avoided.
The goal, Carlos Cruz-Casa, Chief Innovation Officer with DTPW’s Office of Innovation and Mobility Services explains, “is to help share the learnings from what we are doing here so it can be replicated in other areas throughout the United States.”
Looking Ahead
Should you have any questions regarding this and how it could impact your shipments, please reach out to our team today.
Additionally, we have our weekly market updates that can provide you with relevant freight news, updates, developments across the industry, and more.