A video following a cargo ebike across the city: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ARTLXxPI2X0

Through this grant, the City piloted using advanced technologies to test Zero-Emission Delivery Zones (ZEDZs) in a 16-block area of downtown Portland by allowing only zero-emission delivery vehicles to use the loading zones in the project area.

In today’s world, commerce moves at a rapid pace. Items can be ordered and delivered in a matter of days—if not hours. The freight and logistics industry enables our cities to thrive and move at an unprecedented speed, but there can be tradeoffs when it comes to the health of our communities and our planet. The emissions from urban logistics vehicles have an outsized impact on our climate compared to emissions from passenger vehicles. Freight accounts for only five percent of on-road vehicle miles traveled (VMT) but almost a quarter of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions.

Last-mile delivery is also a major source of pollution that negatively impacts air quality in our neighborhoods, accounting for almost half of the transportation sector’s nitrogen dioxide (NOx2) emissions and more than half of its PM2.5 emissions.

Long-term public health impacts can be especially significant in areas where freight vehicles frequently load and unload, wait in traffic, idle, or circle the block to look for parking. In addition, communities of color and communities living with low incomes face exponentially higher health impacts of diesel pollution.

Besides the effects on our climate and our bodies, the presence of large trucks can also contribute to noise pollution, traffic congestion, and safety hazards like double parking.

Despite these urgent problems, the United States lags behind other countries in planning for freight decarbonization. A study by the Urban Freight Lab at the University of Washington showed that fewer than half of the U.S. cities they studied had considered last-mile 5 freight in their sustainability planning, and of those, less than one third had expressed an intention to dedicate resources toward addressing the issue. Portland was one of only U.S. seven cities whose plans the researchers found to be substantial and comprehensive enough to reduce urban freight emissions.