Hacker News new | ask | show | jobs
by Flocular 1434 days ago
I think this is trying to solve delivery inside cities. However, I don't see cities beeing clogged by parcel delivery services. Transportation of goods is more problematic on the inter-city level. But that's too far to build a tunnel. What is causing troubles for cities seems to mostly be human traffic (that's why rush-hour is a thing) - for that subways could indeed be a solution. Unless Switzerland's traffic is looking completly different from what I know from Germany of course?
2 comments

(I'm a German living in Switzerland)

All your questions can be answered with "Switzerland has a functioning railroad" (for public transport).

Compare the modal share between Zurich and Frankfurt [0]. 44% of travelers in the Frankfurt area use a private motor vehicle, whereas only 21% do in Zurich.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modal_share#Metropolitan_areas...

> However, I don't see cities beeing clogged by parcel delivery services.

Cities are clogged by any kind of vehicle period. Particularly delivery trucks will run into issues in the future as more and more European cities start enacting low emission zones/diesel bans inner-city [0], yet the overwhelming number of delivery trucks are diesel.

> Transportation of goods is more problematic on the inter-city level.

Inter-city has rail and lorries with trailers, both do not work inside the city where every extra vehicle leads to extra congestion due to the high density of everything.

> Unless Switzerland's traffic is looking completly different from what I know from Germany of course?

Berlin, Darmstadt, Hamburg and Stuttgart already have diesel bans and low-emission zones inner-city. In most bigger cities driving into the center is an exercise in frustration, not just due to congestion but particularly due to lack of parking spaces.

[0] https://www.transportenvironment.org/wp-content/uploads/2021...

> Cities are clogged by any kind of vehicle period. Particularly delivery trucks will run into issues in the future as more and more European cities start enacting low emission zones/diesel bans inner-city [0], yet the overwhelming number of delivery trucks are diesel.

Here in the Netherlands, it seems electric delivery vans [1] and cargo bicycles [2] are becoming more and more popular.

[1] https://www.ttm.nl/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/DHL-Goupil-met...

[2] https://www.emerce.nl/content/uploads/2017/05/PostNL.jpg