Projects
LaMiLo
Institute's role: Lead partner
Background: LaMiLo (Last Mile Logistics) aimed to create a step change in freight deliveries by ensuring that the ‘last mile’ of a supply chain is fully considered when planning a freight logistics journey. By utilising more environmentally friendly transport methods such as electric vehicles and where possible, encouraging the use of freight movement by water, LaMiLo also helped to reduce CO2 levels in city centres and freight hubs.
Challenge: Globalisation and an increase in e-commerce have changed how consumers shop, however, while many organisations extend their supply chains to large retailers but do not focus on ‘last mile’ deliveries to homes or smaller shops. As a result, opportunities for financial, congestion and carbon savings are missed; 60% of small home deliveries fail to reach their destination first time, which generates additional CO2 and increases congestion as well as delivery costs.
Activity: LaMiLo brought together partners from the private, public sector and third sector and it helped to:
- Deliver pilot projects across the region to test real life last mile logistics solutions at scale. This included combining domestic deliveries, using passenger transport for deliveries, setting up neighbourhood parcel drop-off centres and changing delivery times to reduce congestion
- Quantify the impact of existing last mile delivery practice in terms of cost, carbon, congestion, noise and cost to business of late deliveries
- Develop strategies to plan and simulate more efficient and effective ‘last mile’ logistic solutions and explore ways to help change the behaviour of target groups and improve public sector policy
- Research legal and planning contexts and market viability across the North West Europe region and identify best practice.
The research, best practice and solutions have been shared for potential replication to help improve existing transport congestion in cities and transport corridor routes and networks across Europe.
Partners: The Institute was one of 15 organisations from across NWE including Belgium Road Research Centre, Brussels Mobilite, Cross River Partnership, Eco2city, Institute du Droit International des Transports, Irish Exporters Association, London Borough of Camden, Perth and Kinross Council, PTV Group, Tactran, Technische Universität Dortmund, The Green Link and Luxembourg Institute of Science and Technology (LIST). In the UK, the Institute also worked closely with the Rail Freight Group and Transport for London.
Funders: The project was part-funded by the Interreg IVB NWE programme and the European Regional Development Fund.
Further information: For more information on LaMiLo click here.
