The Physical Internet (PI) is arguably the most ambitious vision in transport logistics: fully consolidated freight flows from independent shippers, moving through open, connected, shared networks — just like data packets on the digital internet. But how far has practice actually come?
A paper by Van Duin, Anand, Moolenburgh, Quak and Tavasszy in the City Logistics 2025 proceedings (Transportation Research Procedia, Vol. 98) benchmarks Dutch city logistics against the ALICE roadmap to the Physical Internet, which sets milestones in five layers through 2040: logistics nodes, networks, systems of networks, access & adoption, and governance.
The good news first. On the technical layers, the Netherlands is broadly on track. The hub market is buzzing with innovative local players (Hubbel, MyPup, CityHub, and many others), the “local heroes” offering an alternative to the big logistics platforms. CityHub, operating in six Dutch cities, shows what a Generation 2 node looks like: edge-of-city hubs, delivery by cargo bike, e-van or e-truck, 24-hour shipment visibility, plus warehousing, moving services and packaging collection. Hubs are becoming centroids of networks by consolidating new freight flows with traditional ones. Zero-emission zones, walking-and-cycling policies and differing district profiles are pushing multimodal delivery from nice-to-have to must-have.
Promising network-of-networks initiatives are emerging too. The Green City Hubs Network (Netwerk van Groene Stadshubs) bundles independent local hubs into national coverage for emission-free delivery. And the SMART BRICK experiment in construction logistics links digital-twin data to a physical brick, allowing “intelligent cargo” to find its most sustainable route by road or water; an early glimpse of the internet of cargo.
Now the sobering part. The authors conclude that access, adoption and governance are lagging badly. Companies hesitate to invest jointly because returns on shared assets are unclear; the underlying problem is a lack of trust between competitors on the same playing field. Service chains remain vertically disconnected, and horizontally the market stays fragmented among small players who fail to scale.
Open, multilateral connections (the essence of PI) are still a bridge too far. Smart contracts remain experimental and lack legal backing. And the legal complexity is daunting: data privacy, data governance, competition law, liability and contracts are all intertwined. The paper argues for government integration at all levels, fair access rules in the spirit of the Digital Markets Act, and lighter regulation for SMEs so newcomers can still enter the market.
The authors’ recommendation: formalize this assessment into a Physical Internet Maturity Index for city logistics. Only if we know how fast, or slow, the landscape is really changing will government and industry feel the urgency to act.