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– Research team explores potential for package delivery
Courtesy TUM: Cargo bikes can play a much bigger role in delivering urban packages. This conclusion was reached in a study based on the cities of Munich and Regensburg, where about one seventh of the CO2 emissions related to supply could be reduced.
The research team developed a planning tool to help companies and municipalities identify the potential for cargo bikes in the city’s neighborhoods.
Online retail was growing even before the pandemic. A purchase takes just one click and the delivery vehicle is soon stopping in front of the buyer’s door. But home delivery comes at a cost to people and the environment: package services represent a substantial part of motorized road traffic in cities.
Electric cargo bikes offer an alternative. With transport boxes larger than those of normal bicycles, they can carry around 50 packages. But these e-bikes are not widely used by logistics companies.
Using the examples from Munich and Regensburg, mobility researchers and economists from the Technical University of Munich – TUM and the Catholic University of Eichstätt-Ingolstadt – KU have now completed a study on the potential of freight bikes and developed a planning tool. “With our study, we identified the additional infrastructure needed to use bicycles successfully.
This would take the form of micro deposits strategically positioned throughout the city, ”says Pirmin Fontaine, assistant professor of operations management at KU, who led the study. The goods would be sent to these distribution containers by truck and transported from there to customers on cargo bikes. Deposits can receive remittances during periods of low traffic.
Advantages in high density areas
However, this concept of logistics would not pay off in all urban areas. “Cargo bikes can be used best in built-up areas, with short distances between package deliveries and where delivery vans find it difficult to find parking,” says Stefan Minner, professor of logistics and supply chain management at TUM.
The research team developed a tool based on a mathematical optimization model to identify suitable areas.
An analysis of several scenarios showed: Cargo bikes can potentially deliver around 28% of all packages in Munich and 37% in Regensburg. This could reduce the total kilometers driven by motorized delivery vehicles by 16 percent and 18 percent, respectively, in both cities – and lead to 14 and 17 percent reductions in delivery-related CO2 emissions.
Cost savings when companies work together
The model’s calculations also show that the use of cargo bicycles would mean only a small cost savings for logistics companies. Although delivery vehicles have higher indirect costs, freight bikes would inevitably have to travel more in total due to the smaller loads they carry.
Additional cost savings would be generated if several logistics companies cooperated to avoid overlapping trips. The research team determined that the total kilometers could be reduced by 29 percent for two partners and by 42 percent for three partners. “This form of logistical consolidation, with several service providers working together, can also generate huge cost savings,” says Pirmin Fontaine.
Support for micro deposits
To enable companies to efficiently integrate freight bikes with logistics concepts, the research team is offering a planning tool and a user’s guide free of charge. This can also be useful for municipalities.
“The use of cargo bikes in city centers is an egg-and-chicken problem,” says Rolf Moeckel, professor of spatial mobility modeling at TUM. “Where service providers do not find adequate infrastructure, there is no incentive for them to adapt their logistics.” Consequently, in view of the scarcity of space, especially for the placement of micro deposits, political support is needed.
More information: Online planning tool – The RadLast project was funded by the Federal Minister for Transport and Digital Infrastructure (BMVI) under the National Cycling Plan.
Contacts for this article: Prof. Dr. Stefan Minner -Munich Technical University -TUM
President of Logistics and Supply Chain Management – stefan.minner@tum.de
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