Supporting better kerbside management for last-mile logistics
October 15, 2024
How can we improve safety, sustainability, and efficiency on UK high streets?
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On a typical busy high street, the competition for space is part of daily life. Whether you’re trying to park, deliver goods, get to work, or simply go to your favourite shop or restaurant—we all just want to get to our destination and complete our tasks as quickly as possible. And for everyone, especially businesses, time is money.
Unfortunately, this constant pressure on people’s time can also lead to an inefficient use of space on the high street and in last-mile logistics. Multiple businesses often need to make deliveries at the same high street locations during limited time windows. With a fixed number of bays working on a ‘first come, first served’ basis this results in suppliers circling the road network until they can find a nearby spot to deliver their goods.
Delivery drivers who are struggling to get close enough to their destinations will sometimes resort to parking in spots meant for the public. And sometimes they park in unsafe or illegal places. All of this can lead to unnecessary congestion, inefficiency, parking fines, and even health and safety issues for pedestrians or cyclists.
Stantec is supporting Grid Smarter Cities with the implementation of its Kerb® solution.
By 2030, the demand for parcels will have more than doubled in London. On top of this, the UK loses £7.5 billion every year because of congestion. So, how can we get last-mile logistics working the way it should? How can we create organisation and structure out of a system that is becoming increasingly chaotic?
Building more roads doesn’t necessarily reduce congestion. And there often isn’t the space to create new places to park. The solution may be a relatively simple one that is right under our noses in the form of better kerbside management.
A digital solution for a growing problem
As with many fixes today, the answer could lie in technology. It can help make city kerbside activity smarter and easier to manage. Using innovative digital technology and with our help, Grid Smarter Cities has moved beyond a conceptual idea of kerbside management. We have partnered to gain valuable insight from real-world implementation via Grid Smarter Cities’ Kerb® platform.
The concept is relatively simple. It involves the creation of new, bookable loading and virtual dynamic kerb bays. It uses a digital management platform integrated into an app. This allows freight drivers to book slots for access, deliver goods and services to the right place at the right time, support delivery certainty, and reduce penalty charge notices. The technology enables kerbside loading bay restrictions to be easily understood and recreated on the app.
The UK loses £7.5 billion every year because of congestion. So, how can we get last-mile logistics working the way it should?
Users can also book in advance, so more deliveries can be completed within the same period. A bookable kerbside means urban areas have more flexibility to make better use of their kerb space. This, in turn, limits delivery vehicles and congestion while improving air quality and safety.
It also adds an element of dynamism to a space. For example, a kerb space can be used by kerb owners as a loading bay in the morning, as a cargo bike delivery bay in the afternoon, a street eatery in the evening, and taxi rank by night. Dynamic kerbside management, as a concept, suggests a viable solution to meet the growing demands and challenges in the world of freight-delivery access.
Engaging our teams
Our transport planning team, working with Grid Smarter Cities, produced in-depth research that showed the diverse benefits of this kerbside management idea for both kerb owners and users.
We assessed the digital kerb management products using the Department for Transport’s Transport Appraisal Guidance. And, as part of the assessment, we defined a range of parameters and metrics. These included delivery-slot duration, kerbside capacity, and kerbside demand.
A recent report demonstrates the benefits of the Kerb platform for delivery drivers, kerb owners, and local authorities.
We used these assumptions to review the performance of the products in diverse urban settings and to compare costs and benefits. It also allowed us to give local authorities and delivery companies insight into a valuable new data layer provided by virtual and permit bays for last-mile logistics.
Our research showed that better kerbside management could bring a wide range of benefits to local authorities, delivery operators, and road users. How? By reducing the need for vehicles to circulate while looking for a safe space to make a delivery. All of this was laid out in our report, Loads Easier: Unlocking the power of the kerb. This uncovered the use of kerbside management as a greener, smarter solution to managing the growing freight delivery challenge in London. There are also safety benefits for pedestrians in these areas of high footfall, due to fewer vehicles circling and more compliant kerbside behaviour.
From concept to implementation
On the back of the report’s findings around the economic, social, and health benefits of the Kerb platform, it’s now live in London. Southwark Council embraced the idea of bookable bays on Walworth Road as part of its Streets for People strategy.
Southwark Council embraced the idea of bookable bays and digital kerbside management. This is its commitment to improve residents’ quality of life and act on climate change, by changing how people travel and use streets in the borough.
The council is now managing five numbered loading bays across two parking areas on either side of Walworth Road—a busy high street. The users of the bays are a mix of larger business fleets and heavy goods vehicles as well as a proportion of smaller, local traders. These users can book slots in 15-minute increments. Four double-sided, e-ink smart signs have also been installed to support the bookings, providing users with on-street visibility of their booking and dissuading misuse.
With smarter decisions—including better kerbside management—we can do more with these more dynamic spaces, making better use of the high street.
As the trial in Southwark continues, we’re gaining insight into how this kerbside-management concept performs in reality. Will people stick to the concept? Is it working in practice—providing the expected benefits? We’re discovering all of this, with live performance and revenue data coming in over the next year.
We’ve also completed an innovative Power BI dashboard for Grid Smarter Cities. It allows local authorities and delivery fleets to gain personalised benefits reports based on their exacting needs.
As the Kerb platform rolls out nationally, there is immense potential to boost air quality, improve safety, and reduce congestion. It will do this while increasing revenues for local authorities and reducing operational costs or inefficiencies for delivery companies. Bottom line: it will simplify daily lives on the nation’s high streets.