by Walther Ploos van Amstel
Municipalities often assume that introducing or expanding a zero-emission zone (ZE zone) will be enough to decarbonize urban logistics. The reality is more complex. According to the latest figures from the Netherlands Enterprise Agency (RVO), more than 50,000 electric light commercial vehicles (LCVs) are currently on the road in the Netherlands. Yet adoption is far …
Parcel lockers are rapidly becoming part of the everyday postal landscape, and nowhere is that more evident than in the United Kingdom. Royal Mail and Post Office have announced a partnership to pilot parcel lockers at Post Office branches across the country. Over the next six months, lockers will be installed outside selected stores, allowing …
In 2023, the United Nations General Assembly declared the first-ever UN Decade of Sustainable Transport, starting in 2026. This Decade marks a rare political moment in which transport is explicitly recognised as a critical enabler of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). While transport does not have its own standalone SDG, it underpins progress on climate action, …
Customers increasingly expect fast and precise delivery information, yet logistics service providers know that committing too early to delivery time windows can seriously undermine route efficiency. A recent paper tackles that tension head-on by asking a deceptively simple question: is it worth waiting before communicating delivery time windows to customers? The authors focus on next-day …
Europe’s transition to zero-emission trucks (ZETs) has reached a decisive phase. While EU CO₂ standards for heavy-duty vehicles are among the most ambitious globally, the pace of real-world deployment still lags what is needed to meet the 2030 target of roughly 35% zero-emission truck sales. The Smart Freight Centre report, with contributions from ACEA and …
The European Commission’s report, A practical methodology for implementing circular solutions, offers a concrete, operational framework for turning circular economy ambitions into implementable projects at the city and regional levels. Developed within the Circular Cities and Regions Initiative (CCRI), the methodology directly addresses a recurring challenge in logistics and urban systems: while circular strategies are widely adopted …
Europe’s last-mile parcel delivery system is approaching a structural breaking point. Rapid growth in e-commerce, driven by platforms such as Amazon, Temu, and Shein, combined with the expansion of recommerce via players like Vinted and eBay, and return-intensive fashion flows from Zalando, H&M, and ZARA, is overwhelming traditional door-to-door delivery and parcel shop models. As …
The Dutch Labour Inspectorate is preparing its toughest intervention yet against Uber Eats, proposing to shut down the platform in the Amsterdam region for one month. The move follows years of enforcement actions and repeated findings that the company has failed to adequately prevent undocumented workers from operating as meal couriers. NRC reports about it. …
U.S. city logistics teams don’t need to wait for a perfect “European-style” Zero- or Low-Emission Zone authority to start decarbonizing urban freight. The key lesson from the Urban Freight Lab’s 2025 framework is that many Z/LEZ outcomes can be achieved with tools cities already control, if those tools are combined into a deliberate package and …
The recent study Logistics for Building Circular, Biobased, and Modular: Environmental Impacts in Amsterdam, published in the Journal of Circular Economy, examines the role of logistics in circular construction practices, with a specific focus on the urban context of Amsterdam. The article analyses how logistics systems influence the environmental performance of circular, biobased, and modular …