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I feel delivery companies should bid for providing service for the last couple of kilometers, then the winner should get an exclusive contract for some time fra

by rerx 7y ago

I feel delivery companies should bid for providing service for the last couple of kilometers, then the winner should get an exclusive contract for some time frame. That's how it's done for other services like regional rail public transport.

rerx 7y ago
Did I hit a nerve by picking public transport as an example? If it does not work out, regulations are bad. Competing non cooperating infrastructure service providers are a bad idea if they hinder each other.
gruez 7y ago
>That's how it's done for other services like regional rail public transport. Ask any Brit how privatized rail's working out for them.
- rerx 7y ago
  Regional rail works okayish in Germany. A part of the regions and lines are carried by private business, others by the former monopolist that is still fully owned by the state.
Nasrudith 7y ago
Why exclusive contract? What is gained? Rail right of way is exclusive just from geometry and there are various historical "accidents" involved in ownership from no longer relevant reasons but there are myraid ways to deliver mail which may or may not be excluding. A forced bidding system seems to give gameability and artifical barriers to entry for little gain. To give an anchhacic example of the sort of problems it would be akin to requiring a business that can serve all of New York City competively before bidding. Having a mail room in the lobby of a large apartment would violate that due to serving only residents.
- rerx 7y ago
  I was thinking of parcel deliveries. Narrowish European inner city streets are regularly blocked by delivery trucks and fundamentally it's unnecessarily many of them because there are so many different companies servicing the same street. Where I live double parking on bicycle lanes is extremely common (the individual delivery people often see no alternatives), which poses massive dangers to cyclists. Also these trucks typically are quite large, worsening all issues, because a full load is meant for a long route. If there was just a single company responsible for some "last mile" area, smaller vehicles like this electric model [1] would suffice. They would distribute parcels from a depot that is filled by larger long distance trucks that do not need to belong to the same company. The last point is important: If DHL, FedEx, UPS etc. each have their own final storage buildings and delivery fleet, those depots could not all be situated close enough to the target addresses. [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/StreetScooter https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/StreetScooter

by rerx 7y ago

rerx 7y ago

Did I hit a nerve by picking public transport as an example? If it does not work out, regulations are bad. Competing non cooperating infrastructure service providers are a bad idea if they hinder each other.

gruez 7y ago

>That's how it's done for other services like regional rail public transport. Ask any Brit how privatized rail's working out for them.

rerx 7y ago
Regional rail works okayish in Germany. A part of the regions and lines are carried by private business, others by the former monopolist that is still fully owned by the state.

Nasrudith 7y ago

Why exclusive contract? What is gained? Rail right of way is exclusive just from geometry and there are various historical "accidents" involved in ownership from no longer relevant reasons but there are myraid ways to deliver mail which may or may not be excluding. A forced bidding system seems to give gameability and artifical barriers to entry for little gain. To give an anchhacic example of the sort of problems it would be akin to requiring a business that can serve all of New York City competively before bidding. Having a mail room in the lobby of a large apartment would violate that due to serving only residents.

rerx 7y ago
I was thinking of parcel deliveries. Narrowish European inner city streets are regularly blocked by delivery trucks and fundamentally it's unnecessarily many of them because there are so many different companies servicing the same street. Where I live double parking on bicycle lanes is extremely common (the individual delivery people often see no alternatives), which poses massive dangers to cyclists. Also these trucks typically are quite large, worsening all issues, because a full load is meant for a long route. If there was just a single company responsible for some "last mile" area, smaller vehicles like this electric model [1] would suffice. They would distribute parcels from a depot that is filled by larger long distance trucks that do not need to belong to the same company. The last point is important: If DHL, FedEx, UPS etc. each have their own final storage buildings and delivery fleet, those depots could not all be situated close enough to the target addresses. [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/StreetScooter https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/StreetScooter