Light Loading
Challenge
The European Union has committed to sustainable urban development. Its cities and regions must fulfil climate change obligations and manage the urban environment in a way that protects and develops it for future generations. However, the rise in the total EU population living in urban areas has too often been paired with a concurrent rise in vehicles on city streets not built for such large volumes of traffic.
The current shift in consumer trends towards e-commerce and associated rise in delivery vehicles only exacerbates both inefficiencies in traffic flow and exhaust fume pollution.
Approach
The project involved a heavy boots on the ground approach. Documenting everything, understanding trends, habits and the unspoken rules of those making a living in an incredibly complex, stringent environment. Conducting various workshops and information sessions with the appropriate stakeholders allowed for the creation of a service that connected and heeded the needs of those who needed it most.
Solution
Light Loading is a smart bollard service that reduces overall delivery vehicle emissions by allowing for increased dynamism throughout peak service hours. By allowing usage of double yellow lines when necessary, delivery becomes both safer and more environmentally friendly. Curating the selection of overflow bays will drastically reduce unsafe parking.
Context
Collaboration with Smart Dublin & Dublin City Council (Kicking Chaos from the curb)
Timeline
4 weeks
Skills
Research, Interviewing, Service Design, Bodystorming, Prototyping, Workshop Facilitation
“Big vans, small city. Simple as.”
James Atkinson, DPD Sustainability Coordinator
Observation
The project commenced by going out and making sense of the chaos at the street level. Monitoring the behaviour of pedestrians and those who relied on the kerb to carry out their work, problems were able to be chunked and divided into several areas.
The kerbside has so many stakeholders, and the introduction of anything new can completely hamper the livelihood of another. It is an immensely fragile ecosystem.
Findings
Butterfly effect - chaos breeds chaos and unwritten rules and concessions made up the bulk of the activity.
Whatever happens happens.
There are not enough loading bays to deal with the congestion.
Those with impaired mobility are struggling to traverse the chaotic, ever-changing curbside.
Early interviews
Due to the sheer complexity and variety of stakeholders involved, interviews were conducted with various users:
Restaurant owners
Delivery Drivers
Servers
Doordash cyclists
Taxi Drivers
Mobility impaired individuals
Key Findings
A seething hatred towards bollards
Time = money (no matter how it’s done)
Single Item Delivery
Not enough loading bays (nowhere near enough)
Unauthorized parking leading to chaos and danger.
Silent hierarchy between workers based on vehicle size
There’s a lack of flexibility leading to unused spaces by restaurants and misused spaces by deliveries.
Workshop
Conducted a workshop with key Dublin City Council stakeholders to further understand delivery in the city. I wanted to ascertain limitations and opportunities from those who, at the end of the day, would be making the decisions.
The Depot
Interviews were conducted with a variety of delivery drivers on the street and also at the An Post depot in Dublin city centre. Several interviews were also conducted with James Atkinson, sustainability coordinator of DPD as well as UPS and Parcel Motel workers.
Insights
Taxi ranks and loading bays have compatible time limits but are separate areas.
Bollards causing chaos.
Double yellow lines on quiet roads with no loading bays.
Big vans in a small city. Dublin can’t be made wider, needs to be made more flexible and malleable.
Many companies unloading small amounts on the same places.
Private vehicles parking in loading bays with no enforced repercussions.
Not enough appropriately dedicated parking/ loading area (space) - too many areas left unused.
How might we make the bays/parking more flexible to reduce congestion and encourage fair use?
How might we create accessible and organised parking for delivery drivers?
How might we allow for adaptability and flexibility for parcel/ postal delivery?
Solution
Light Loading
Light loading offers delivery companies a more efficient means of working, by providing designated loading bays for their fleet as well as overflow zones when these are full, reusing the currently underutilised space of the double yellow lines.
Delivery companies register their vehicles online.
Smart bollards indicate whether this vehicle is permitted to be in bay or not, giving a visual colour cue of green if yes and red if no.
If loading bays are registered full/near full, double yellow lines open up as flexible loading bays to prevent drivers circling, but also not encourage unnecessary use of these areas. A green light strip indicates if the flexible bay is open and acts as a loading bar before it requests the driver move on.
Web App
Every Delivery service enters delivery vehicles licence plates online. Track availability of loading bays and new overflow bays.
Smart Bollards
Nedap bollards with camera at every loading bay detect whether vehicle is permitted in the space by scanning the licence plate.
Licence plates gets looked up in system
> match = light goes green
> mismatch = light goes red, license plate gets detected - fee
This prevents loading bays being used by unregistered vehicles (something that causes a massive knock on effect).
Overflow Bays
The overflow bays are flexible double yellow lines, allowing delivery drivers the opportunity to utilise these spaces if bays are unavailable, rather than circling and leading to higher emissions.
If 90% of loading bays in a 5 min walking range are full
> LED strip lights up for at least 15 min to allow a delivery driver to set down in a timely manner.
Light strip is green first and starts turning red like a “loading bar” to indicate time left.
New overflow check after 10 min
> capacity still over 90% - strip goes back to fully green and starts running
down again.
This ensures delivery drivers are not encouraged to use these spaces just because they may be closer, but allows them to utilise the space if genuinely necessary, giving an affordance to drivers whilst maintaining public safety.
Visual representation of bay after 3 minutes vs 9 minutes.
