Context and policy framework

Madrid is the capital city of Spain and the third largest metropolitan area in the European Union in terms of population. An important challenge in the city is congestion. The city receives more than one million vehicles on an average day and congestion in the centre is consequently high, resulting in high C02 emissions and poor air quality.

Freight deliveries have also an important impact in such a large city. The centre of Madrid is characterised by narrow streets and a high density of shops. This consequently makes the area difficult for freight operators. Moreover, it has been estimated that light commercial vehicles under 3,500 kg represent 82% of goods vehicles. The average duration of parking is 12 minutes for loading and unloading. Delivery of beverage and food account for 65% of loading and unloading operations making this sector particularly relevant for deployment of new freight solutions.

The City of Madrid has also implemented several measures to promote electric mobility including incentives through parking, access regulations or the introduction of electric vehicles in their own fleet.

Solutions implemented in FREVUE

The objective of the FREVUE partners in Madrid is to reduce congestion as well as the emissions created by the freight sector. To achieve these goals, they established a consolidation centre in the periphery of the city centre, from which electric freight vehicles, operated by project partners SEUR, TNT (both Post & Parcel) and Calidad Pascual (sector of food delivery), conduct ‘last mile’ distribution of their deliveries.

In addition, to further improve the efficiency of the delivery model and to reduce as much as possible the congestion, ICT solutions are applied to the demonstration by ITENA. Finally, improved charging infrastructure for the electric freight vehicles are also tested in the consolidation centre in Madrid.

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