Online grocery delivery: Sustainable practice, or congestion generator and environmental burden?

摘要

Grocery delivery services have seen rapid growth in recent years. We develop a method to estimate changes in travel patterns caused by grocery delivery adoption and apply it to a case study in Seattle, WA. Results suggest that delivery can increase or decrease peak hour emissions (-0.9% to + 4.9%) and vehicle hours traveled (-4.2% to + 6.3%), depending most critically on (1) delivery center location, (2) whether deliveries displace dedicated or non-dedicated shopping trips, (3) the degree to which delivery replaces shopping trips or increases demand, (4) the number of deliveries that can be coordinated in a single route, and (5) delivery timing relative to peak travel periods. No scenarios tested where deliveries originate from the store where customers shop achieve emissions or energy use reductions; however, congestion reductions of 3.4% are still possible if the delivery trips are shifted to off-peak hours.