E-Commerce Is Clogging City Streets With Delivery Trucks (citylab.com) 242
The Atlantic's CityLab describes "a massive surge in deliveries to residential dwellings...creating a traffic nightmare." An anonymous reader quotes their report:
While truck traffic currently represents about 7% of urban traffic in American cities, it bears a disproportionate congestion cost of $28 billion, or about 17% of the total U.S. congestion costs, in wasted hours and gas. Cities, struggling to keep up with the deluge of delivery drivers, are seeing their curb space and streets overtaken by double-parked vehicles, to say nothing of the bonus pollution and roadwear produced thanks to a surfeit of Amazon Prime orders... Often, the box trucks will double-park in a two-lane street if there's no loading zone to pull into, snarling traffic behind them... "The streets were not designed for that kind of activity," says Alison Conway, an assistant professor of civil engineering at the City College of New York.
Scott Kubly, director of the Seattle Department of Transportation, says "With the volume of deliveries, ticketing isn't effective for us in terms of managing the street. UPS and FedEx will just negotiate a lump sum payment for all the tickets they get instead of fighting every ticket"... In 2011 in Washington, D.C., UPS alone received just shy of 32,000 tickets. Instead of adjudicating each ticket, many large cities will strike agreements or introduce programs through which delivery companies can pay off all tickets in one swoop.
The article points out online retails sales have grown 15% every year this decade in the U.S. -- calling it the other side of the "retail apocalypse" that's killing brick-and-mortar stores.
Scott Kubly, director of the Seattle Department of Transportation, says "With the volume of deliveries, ticketing isn't effective for us in terms of managing the street. UPS and FedEx will just negotiate a lump sum payment for all the tickets they get instead of fighting every ticket"... In 2011 in Washington, D.C., UPS alone received just shy of 32,000 tickets. Instead of adjudicating each ticket, many large cities will strike agreements or introduce programs through which delivery companies can pay off all tickets in one swoop.
The article points out online retails sales have grown 15% every year this decade in the U.S. -- calling it the other side of the "retail apocalypse" that's killing brick-and-mortar stores.
And the "unexpected" consequence is... (Score:2)
Re:And the "unexpected" consequence is... (Score:5, Insightful)
"Park wherever you want, boys - it's already paid for!"
I work in Seattle. I rarely drive, though - I take transit (mostly the Sounder and Link light rail nowadays; but I rode busses a lot before). Generally speaking, I have little sympathy for people who insist on driving into the city all the time.
Having said that - I think the cities' arguments here are disingenuous. Over the past 15-20 years, Seattle has intentionally gone on a "parking diet" for various reasons (creating bike lane space; explicitly trying to force people onto transit; etc.). There is now far less roadside parking than there was 20-30 years ago, despite the growth the city has seen... and I doubt Seattle is the only city that has made these choices.
So if Seattle has a problem with UPS and FedEx drivers double-parking and blocking traffic, it's likely a problem they've created themselves.
Re:And the "unexpected" consequence is... (Score:5, Interesting)
... and I doubt Seattle is the only city that has made these choices.
Go visit Tokyo, which has very little street parking. Downtown street parking is wasteful. Streets should be for driving, and parking lots/garages should be for parking. Eliminating street parking frees up lanes for traffic, and cuts down on the number of cars circling the block looking for a space. In SF about 40% of traffic is people looking for parking.
But changing to a more efficient system is difficult because of the politics of parking [economist.com].
Re: And the "unexpected" consequence is... (Score:4, Informative)
a locked metal cage full of packages
The Japanese are pretty law abiding. In Seattle, that would result in a rush of hobos with crow-bars.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
The Japanese are pretty law abiding.
Japan is also extremely non-diverse.
There's a very important lesson to be learned in those two facts.
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
Everyone gets thrown together in the USA, while the melting occurs more around the edges of Japan... but that doesn't mean it is low diverity... just that we don't recognize it because all we see is "Japanse Person". Even a Japanse-American is going to get labeled a "Japanse Person" even though their heritage is highly diverse. A friend of mine in Brazil is 1/2 or quarter Japanese... bu
Re: (Score:2)
'Diversity' taken out of the equation the statement is true.
That cage would be robbed in very short order.
Re: (Score:3)
Came to post this, left satisfied.
Let Seattle stew in their own juices. Part of eliminating on-street parking also took out loading zones.
Re: And the "unexpected" consequence is... (Score:5, Funny)
I rarely drive, though
No offense but with your username, I can see why. ;)
1 truck, better than 20+ shoppers... (Score:5, Insightful)
As a cheap-skate, before the age of reliable internet shopping, sometimes I'd go to a shop 5 times before any significant purchase.
Now, most of that browsing is done online. plenty of folks still go for the 'mall experience', but I'd say that for every truck winding down the alleys, you're avoiding a much larger number of folks routing to a set of shops, then back.
In terms of road damage, the single truck likely does slightly more wear over time (more weight at once, worse than many smaller weights), but in terms of congestion, the truck is going to be spending much less overall time on the main roads every day, than the shoppers would.
But really, are we actually going back to "is the internet bad for our shared resources" discussions?
Far too late to put that genie back in the bottle - it's granting too many important wishes to go back now.
Ryan Fenton
Re:1 truck, better than 20+ shoppers... (Score:5, Informative)
Re:1 truck, better than 20+ shoppers... (Score:4, Interesting)
The problem here is that a delivery truck will make a stop in the middle of a street not meant for that activity
They need to make their deliveries. I think if the cities are upset about it, they should crack down more on trucks stopping in the middle of the street. Stop issuing cheap tickets, and start issuing expensive ones like $250 per incident, increase the ticket fine per company AND per vehicle based on the number of incidents, And stop negotiating bulk deals.
If unpaid tickets for a company exceeds $2,000, then boot and tow any vehicle owned by their company seen on sight..
When property owners can't get their stuff delivered, they'll make changes to their property, so the trucks have someplace to park that is not in the public right of way.
Re:1 truck, better than 20+ shoppers... (Score:5, Insightful)
When property owners can't get their stuff delivered, they'll make changes to their property, so the trucks have someplace to park that is not in the public right of way.
I'd be curious to hear how you think that could happen in an actual city, where businesses are not in stand-alone buildings and their only exposure is a few feet of city-owned sidewalk.
Re: (Score:2)
Alleys and loading docks. Make the mandatory in city codes. It will take some time, but eventually, every building will include an off-street space for trucks.
<rant> What about those stinking auto dealers? How can I get a business/development permit for an outfit whose primary function is to take multiple deliveries of large goods from even larger trucks. And then say "Nope. I'm not even going to pave a little strip at the back of my property for the trucks to pull in. I'll just have them park and unload in the middle of the city street."
Re: (Score:2)
Replaced or remodeled. Anything you need a permit for.
Re: (Score:3)
One approach is to have "delivery points" spaced about two blocks apart. These can be in stores (preferably ones with late hours), or street-accessible boxes. Packages are left at the delivery points, rather than to every individual's door. This worked well when I lived in an apartment complex. Packages were delivered to the office, not to every apartment, so the delivery trucks weren't cluttering up the streets. In fact, they had dedicated parking spots at the office for deliveries.
If the trucks are d
Re: (Score:2)
You are forgetting that Washington DC politicians basically everyone uses fedex and ups. Hell even the post office stops in the street.
Re: (Score:3)
When property owners can't get their stuff delivered, they'll make changes to their property, so the trucks have someplace to park that is not in the public right of way.
That's very unlikely. What is far more likely is that delivery companies will simply increase shipping charges to those cities to compensate. Then, when voting taxpayers find out that their costs are far higher than in more logically run cities, the officials that followed your advice lose their jobs at the next election.
Re: (Score:2)
Put lockers at regular intervals along roads. Or get delivery companies to support the lockers you can already buy for your house. They are basically lockable boxes that open with an electronic key like a bar code (e.g. time based shared code). Some have scales built in so they can tell if anything was removed or swapped.
Re: (Score:2)
What is far more likely is that delivery companies will simply increase shipping charges to those cities to compensate.
When taxpayers complain, this is likely to result in ordinances being passed prohibiting the shipping company from charging a rate higher than the prevalent rate to people with an address while conducting their delivery business in city limits, or with a destination address inside their city. They'll probably create a new tax, figure the tax to be the amount on the difference in shipp
Re: (Score:2)
That assumes the people who can't get their stuff delivered are property owners, as opposed to tenants. And it assumes that property owner will make changes to their property costing anywhere from tens of thousands to hundreds of thousands (if it's even possible at all) to provide parking for delivery vehicles. Or, in other other words, y
Re: (Score:2)
And it assumes that property owner will make changes to their property costing anywhere from tens of thousands to hundreds of thousands
The property owners will find a way to accommodate the delivery companies, Otherwise they will wind up losing their tenants and being unable to rent out the property; if it will cost them more $$$ than the cost to carve out a parking space, the owner will obviously find a way....
Re: (Score:3)
All that will happen is smarter companies will redesign their delivery methods, this to substantially reduce the size of required final end point delivery vehicles. It boils down to how many, how large and how far apart are their distribution centres for package handling. This affects size of runs and how much each truck has to deliver. The old delivery model as practised by postal services is way ahead, where as newer models run by for profits are really bad (low capital cost but really poorly run and more
Re: (Score:2)
The problem here is that a delivery truck will make a stop in the middle of a street not meant for that activity, but a shopper in a car will find a parking spot already designed for that. As we shift to an economy where goods are delivered directly by truck, the traffic infrastructure needs to adapt.
Not sure how it works where you live, but trucks deliver to warehouses and vans deliver to houses. I've bought tons of stuff online and the delivery guy comes in a van about the same size of a car. And he parks in the driveway for 30 seconds rather than taking up an entire 15 square metres of land for hours on end. If you multiply that by the hundreds of parcels he delivers, there is thousands of square metres of expensive city land being freed up by people choosing to buy online instead of at the mall.
Whe
Re: 1 truck, better than 20+ shoppers... (Score:2)
Actually (and unfortunately), road wear is proportional to the fourth power of the axle weight. Double the vehicle weight, do sixteen times the damage.
Still cheaper than if everybody drove to get stuff (Score:2, Insightful)
The delivery truck makes many stops per route. An individual shopper makes just one stop and needs a parking space.
Re: (Score:2)
Uh...so does the truck. That's sort of the issue here--trucks blocking the street while delivering packages.
Comment removed (Score:4, Insightful)
Moving the congestion around- not new congestion (Score:5, Insightful)
When retail stores were in downtown areas, there was tremendous congestion when people went to shop.
When they moved around to different malls, there was still a lot of congestion around the strip centers and malls (as recently as the 90s, I remember waiting thru 15-20 minutes of traffic to get into the parking lot.
Now, I bought and paid for 5 products on amazon- I didn't drive- I didn't consume gas- I didn't contribute to congestion on the roads- I didn't get into a car accident, and my car wasn't damaged in the parking lot.
Say 20 consumers shopping personally consume 400 minutes of road time-- 20 shoppers delivery shopping consume 40 minutes of road time.
The problem is the parking infrastructure will need to adapt.
There was a time when we had a mail box at every house. Now, a lot of places have 1 mail box.
Perhaps we'll end up with a big centralized delivery hub for each block. Perhaps a designated parking area for delivery vehicles.
Amazon is looking into drones.
In any case, it's not a problem in my neighborhood yet. They pull up, drop off stuff. The road is constricted but not blockded at any time. Then they leave within 2-3 minutes. This may be more of a problem for high rise condos or apartment buildings than residential neighborhoods.
Re: (Score:3)
If a particular shop only manages to make one sale to someone on your street in a given day,
But there are deliveries being made every day to practically every house on the street. By the US Post Office. And there is a community mailbox just across the street from me with a couple of big parcel bins.
I've had a number of on-line sellers use parcel post and it seems neither more expensive nor slower than UPS or FedEx.
old problems (Score:5, Informative)
Re: (Score:2)
had to be restricted to certain hours
What good is my prime membership if I have to wait! My taxes paid for those roads so everyone else can put up. /sarcasm (i'm not home anyway)
Re: (Score:2)
You know, in ancient Rome and even outlying territories, they had worked out that commercial deliveries had to be restricted to certain hours to make things manageable. You would think we would um, take advantage of proven techniques like that?
We do where I live. Catch up...
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:2)
Seems like a terrible idea.
They deliver packages in the daylight because that's when the most people are available to accept packages instead of leaving them outside where they might disappear.
I'm sure they would prefer night time delivery for the minimal traffic but it would require the implementation of secure drop offs an expense most aren't willing to pay for now.
Re:old problems (Score:4, Interesting)
They deliver packages in the daylight because that's when the most people are available to accept packages instead of leaving them outside where they might disappear.
People who work away from home aren't available to accept packages during business hours. The first big courier company to capitalise on this by concentrating on evening delivery will make a fortune.
I have an idea! (Score:5, Funny)
Re: (Score:2)
Many houses still have chimneys. Seems like they could be converted to drone landing pads and package delivery tubes.
Re:I have an idea! (Score:5, Funny)
Given the condition some of my packages arrive in, that's already in widespread use.
Not in my neighborhood... (Score:2)
Seattle (Score:2)
Seattle is where both Amazon and UPS were founded. What is he complaining about?
The problem is called "city" (Score:4, Informative)
or, more appropriately, "anthill". Too many people cramped together in too little space cause traffic jams. Either live with it or move to a less populated area.
Re: (Score:2)
Um, no. Traffic jams are caused by too many cars on the road at the same time, not too many people. If all those people were in buses, the roads would be almost empty [humantransit.org].
And it isn't population density that puts all those cars on the road, it's parking space density, which is pretty much the opposite of population density. Most cars on the road at any given time are traveling from one parking space to another, so the way to get rid of cars is the same as the way to get rid of pigeons: eliminate places for them
No Enforcement? (Score:3)
Why are these trucks double-parked and blocking traffic? Why aren't the police enforcing the traffic laws?
That would both encourage more efficient delivery methods and take up some of the time they spend locking up kids for having a joint in their pocket, so it sounds like win-win.
Who's getting paid?
Lots of tickets issued (Score:2)
As the post says. The failure is that they don't hurt the delivery people enough.
Re: (Score:2)
Why are these trucks double-parked and blocking traffic?
Because there's no space to make a delivery
Why aren't the police enforcing the traffic laws?
They are. To the full extent of the law these people are being handed fines just like anyone else would get.
Who's getting paid?
The council. It says so right in the summary that the companies pay all fines in bulk as just a cost of doing business.
Delivery will eventually be centralized (Score:2)
There will be a single payer system that will deliver to everyone. They'll call it something clever, like "United States Postal Service." They'll organize delivery areas and rationalize it so that only one delivery person needs visit every street every day. No congestion. Predictable delivery.
Seriously, this seems to have become a "problem" with the Amazon doing it's own deliveries. I see more generic white vans with Amazon logos than I do Fedex or UPS trucks.
What I don't get is why it wouldn't make mo
If the problem is residential, how about (Score:2)
You know, most people have things called "jobs" (it's why they're called "business hours"), so they're not home then anyway.
I would personally love to have expensive packages delivered when I'm home, and have the driver actually wait for me to get to the door to take them.
How do those drones look now (Score:2)
Everyone who, over the past year or two, has balked, laughed at, or ignored at the thought of drone-based package delivery can now stare blankly into the inevitable future. Ecommerce companies saw this coming. The first one there will absolutely crush their competition.
Streets Designed ? (Score:2)
At least they travel systematically. (Score:2)
The delivery vans and trucks will be on routes, stop only where they need to deliver (or a central point for multiple deliveries).
Unlike the random hopping of consumers all fighting for premium parking while scraping for the Best Deal they can, burning parking money and fuel, which eats into their budget for spending...
Seems like an interesting trade-off to me...
"nightmare" is an overused word (Score:2)
The Trump Presidency, OTOH....
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
"These exist already. Every home and building is connected. It's just that there is this weird reluctance to use them. They are called Sewers and Storm Drains. "
Because we really want my wife's monthly protein bar delivery to come leaping out of the toilet.
Re: So how about... (Score:4, Funny)
Because we really want my wife's monthly protein bar delivery to come leaping out of the toilet.
There's so much comedic potential there, I haven't a clue where the fuck to even begin...
Re:So how about... (Score:5, Insightful)
I know it suits some, but man...I'd not like to live that crowded.
I like not having a problem getting things delivered to me.
To each his own I guess.
Re: So how about... (Score:2)
Re:So how about... (Score:4, Interesting)
Interestingly for all the downsides the actual lifestyle doesn't exclude any of those.
- No land or yard of my own is a major benefit. The local park is kept meticulous by the council and is much bigger than the yard in my house in suburbia (currently rented out while I live in the city).
- Sharing walls with neighbours isn't an issue. The only sound that ever comes through is when someone needs to core drill the wall. I've heard that once in the past year. I had more problems in the suburb with noisy neighbours having backyard parties.
- I have friends over for a BBQ all the time. Actually when the sun is out the park is full of people cooking up huge feasts for their friends and families, and when it's cold miserable and raining, well the BBQ turns into an oven roast and they all still come over.
But there's one big on topic thing here:
The only time I ever had problems with deliveries was in suburbia. Multiple parcels stolen from in front of my house, or even better that "I'm sorry we missed you!" card that says please be home during business hours otherwise you can drive some 5km away to pick up your parcel.
Here in an apartment complex, the postie rings through the numbers until someone answers and then leaves me a note saying "Your parcel is with your neighbour at number 71". On the odd occasion where it needs a signature or the building is completely empty, I have 2 UPS parcel points, 3 TNT parcel points, and 3 general post locations within walking distance from my house. The only time this has ever gone wrong is when I walked to the wrong TNT parcel point (It said a certain brand of petrol station, but I didn't realise there were two petrol stations of the same brand so close).
As a member of team inner city living, I too now like not having a problem getting things delivered to me.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
Hmm....this sounds to me like yet another reason not to want to live in a dense, urban setting
And what reason is that, being a sucker for Fake News?
TFS fails the logic test. If people are buying online instead of going to the shops themselves shops it means less vehicles on the road. Since one delivery truck can deliver hundreds of parcels instead of hundreds of individuals each driving one car each to go out and buy a t-shirt each. And we're not even going into the masses of bicycle delivery services around now meaning even less cars.
Don't believe everything you read...
Re: (Score:2)
How about they use bikes - https://www.google.co.jp/searc... [google.co.jp]
It works fine here. I almost never see large delivery trucks driving around residential areas, but somehow Amazon has SAME-DAY shipping in all large cities, without even having to pay extra.
Re: (Score:2)
or: https://www.google.be/search?q... [google.be]
Re: (Score:2)
Locally, UPS has been using golf cars.
But what ultimately will solve the wear and tear and crowding of the streets is going to be when the skies blacken with legions of drones!
Re: (Score:2)
... some sort of public transport service for deliveries?
Suddenly, the idea of drones to deliver merchandise doesn't sound as crazy as it did when Silicon Valley first suggested it.
Re: (Score:2)
Don't you dare use the United States Postal Service for deliveries!
The USPS is exorbitantly expensive for any sort of guaranteed delivery. It is also overpriced for packages over a pound. They have weird pricing, like "media mail" where the postage varies, not just by weight and destination, but by the content of the package. So it may be cheap to mail a book, but expensive to mail a t-shirt.
I mean can you imagine the possible efficiency of only one centralized public service
That sounds great in theory, but so does Marxism. Centralization very very rarely beats a competitive market for efficiency.
Re:USPS (Score:4, Insightful)
That sounds great in theory, but so does Marxism. Centralization very very rarely beats a competitive market for efficiency.
Marxism has sounded terrible in theory ever since Game Theory and Information Theory became serious subjects (what, about 50+ years now?)
Same for central planning of anything - it's an information theoretical problem - the central planners always lack sufficient information and sufficient information processing capacity to make good decisions. The information and capacity are distributed in markets.
It's kinda like getting rid of packet-switched networks and having one computer do all of the Internet traffic flow. That would be an unmitigated disaster. Let's name it after Chavez, tho.
Re:USPS (Score:4, Insightful)
But the postal service is a Packet-Switched-Network isn't it?
Re: USPS (Score:2)
Re:USPS (Score:4, Insightful)
Same for central planning of anything - it's an information theoretical problem - the central planners always lack sufficient information and sufficient information processing capacity to make good decisions.
You mean like say the military? Given the choice to defend my home, I'll chose a centralised military over and disorganised rabble carrying pitchforks.
I think you need to revise your hypothesis.
Re: (Score:2)
They have weird pricing, like "media mail" where the postage varies, not just by weight and destination, but by the content of the package.
One time I ordered an electronic part that was quite thin, the shipper sent it between two magazines because media rate was 50% cheaper than first class even though I paid for first class shipping. Needless to say, I didn't buy from that shipper again.
Centralization very very rarely beats a competitive market for efficiency.
USPS consolidated five zip codes into one distribution center, turning four 30,000-sqft facilities into storefront locations. It took five years to remove all the kinks at the existing facility as the combined workload got done with fewer workers.
Re: (Score:3)
Most packages I get are sent SmartPost so they end up being delivered via USPS anyways.
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
This sounds like all the people that bitch about windows that never use it and how slow Intel m3 cpus are again because they never use them and don't have a clue...
I'd rather get anything by USPS and UPS or FEDEX.. comes at a predictable time and generally twice as fast for their basic service and cheaper to boot... (First Class vs Ground)..
Everyone just loves to bash the post office for some reason without any real reason behind it...
Amazon is already fighting this with their locker program.. probably won
Re: (Score:2)
Mm, Amazon. That 2-Day shipping promise that only goes into effect after they get around to locating your item(s) in one of their warehouses....which can take upwards of a week.
I keep reading articles about them roboticising the workforce, and how much faster / efficient / cost-effective it is...but, to my highly subjective human senses, the service seems to be getting worse (and as a Computer Scientist, my interest is piqued how they might be doing that; I jest, of course, I've worked in IT, and I know how
Re:Roads Should be Private (Score:5, Insightful)
Private roads are a great way to make over half the country uninhabitable and unreachable as the tolls necessary to make roads profitable in rural areas would be too high to be practical, thus the roads would never get built which then means these areas will never attain the populations to support roads profitably.
Your link is garbage too. Siting a book summary that doesnt lay out any of the author's evidence does not support your claim at all. But hey, maybe the author has it right and every affluent country in the world has it wrong!
Re: (Score:2)
Private roads are a great way to make over half the country uninhabitable and unreachable as the tolls necessary to make roads profitable in rural areas would be too high to be practical, thus the roads would never get built which then means these areas will never attain the populations to support roads profitably.
Your link is garbage too. Siting a book summary that doesnt lay out any of the author's evidence does not support your claim at all. But hey, maybe the author has it right and every affluent count
Re: (Score:3)
Did you just dismiss a book on the subject and then offer your own off-the-cuff opinion as fact?
Maybe they did, but I can't say I blame them. The book summary provides no evidence for any of the author's claims, and given that the Mises Institute is an ultra-libertarian think tank that also proposes privatizing everything from police to navigable waterways and aquifers, I can't say I'm convinced either. I lean libertarian myself, but I find many of their positions to be extreme.
I have a friend who pays $250 a year dues to a road association that maintains (contracts to maintain) the roads in her area. That's 7% of the Town's taxes on the same property and they don't maintain those rural roads.
Sorry, I'm a bit confused there. I think you're saying that these are dues that she pays voluntarily and not a mandatory fee
Re: (Score:2)
That would be really good for the environment. What's the downside?
Re:Roads Should be Private (Score:5, Insightful)
The free market competition amongst all of the different roads connecting directly to your driveway will ensure that you can always afford to leave your house.
Re: (Score:2)
A truck already costs more than a car due to higher gas consumption, and thus higher total gasoline taxes they pay which are justified as taxes for road maintenance, although in most states, the gas taxes go into the general coffers, not reserved specifically for transportation.
Re: (Score:2)
So, what's the cost of wasting an entire day, visiting several stores, to not find what you're looking for?
If you're wasting an entire day going shopping, you're either doing it wrong, or your stores are twenty miles apart from each other.
Re: (Score:2, Interesting)
most larger online retailers do do that already. it's the priority overnight and same day delivery in larger cities that's causing the problems. if people weren't addicted to "gotta have it now", streets would be just fine.
and as far as " ticketing isn't effective" -- TOW, don't ticket. the delivery companies will train their drivers to park legally pretty damn quick. yes, i realize that just adds yet another truck to the street -- but the ends in this case justify the means. $500-1000+ in fees (towing and
Re: (Score:3)
Though that lesson may be that some areas are simply not practical to deliver too.
Re: (Score:3)
Fedex hands off to Canada Post where I live as well. What I've taken to doing is to put my physical address on line 1 and my PO Box on line 2, just for this sort of situation. Keeps Fedex happy, since they claim they can't deliver to PO Boxes, even though they hand off to Canada Post, and allows Canada Post to have a box number to ship it to.
Re:The truth is.... (Score:5, Interesting)
> Huge malls need to die.
Here in Atlanta, the nearby enclosed mall *did* die. It's now warehouses and a film studio. However the large regional "inverted" shopping center (parking in the middle, stores on the perimeter) is doing well. This reflects the change in people's shopping habits. Rather than spending a day wandering an enclosed mall, lugging stuff from store to store, people would rather drive right to the stores they want to visit, load stuff in their car, then move to the next. Less carrying, and faster.
This is all part of the same trend that online shopping and the success of of super-centers reflects. People don't have as much time to shop, so they want to do it faster and more conveniently.
Re: (Score:3)
And here in South Florida, our malls are generally doing quite well. There are several reasons why:
* The weather sucks outside. Our seasons are Summer, Sauna, Raintorrent, and January. Open-air "lifestyle centers" might do well in California (where it's moderately warm and relatively dry most of the time), but they aren't nearly as appealing in Florida. Sure, high school students on dates might still prefer lifestyle centers on Friday night, but on a hot, steamy, thunderstorm-soaked Saturday afternoon, peop
Re: (Score:2)
I did the mechanical design for the Sears store in that mall. I remember they had an issue with mold growing on the north wall exterior around the time they opened. As well as some issues with Hurricane Andrew shortly before they were due to open and with water dripping from the ductwork after that..
Re: (Score:2)
It's not quite the same. "Strip malls" are called that because they're linear: a line of stores, with parking in front. What he's describing is more like a circle or square, with parking in the middle and stores all around. So "strip mall" doesn't really fit. I guess you could call it a "circle mall"...
Re: (Score:2)
Mail order was around long before ecommerce, just remember that.
Prior to ecommerce you either went to shops with a limited selection but where you could at least see the information on the product box or you shopped from catalogues with a slightly less limited selection but very limited information on each product.
Nowadays you can search on-line and have access to a massive range of products that would just not have been accessible in the pre-internet era. If you want to know more about a product there is usually plenty of information about it available too (though occa
Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3)
Average of at least 46.2 cents per mile
Note that figure is total cost, not marginal cost. Marginal cost of driving is more like 20 cents per mile.
It also requires that you spend an hour (give or take) round trip to Walmart and back, plus the aggravation of dealing with walmarts long lines and absolutely shitty customer service). So at minimum wage, you can add another $10 to that cost. On top of that, even if amazon isn't cheaper than walmart for any given item, there is someone out there that is.
OTOH delivery services generally require you to have someone wait in the house for hours.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
I'm in an urban area and the front step is my hidden spot too. Never had an issue, though I do send high priced stuff to my office.
Re: (Score:3)
It costs me more like a $1-2 in gas to vist walmart.. lets say $3 if yo
Re: (Score:2)
You clearly haven't been in a Walmart. ... Otherwise you'd add people of Walmart as another reason not to go. :-)
Re: Shop. Shop shop (Score:4, Insightful)
C) How the market for commodity retail goods works. Normal margins are about 3% [investopedia.com], similar to Walmart. Do you really think they're going to destroy Walmart any time soon?
Amazon's e-commerce business is a very profitable sideline for them, but they make their money from AWS. They sell much more "stuff" overall, but 90% of Amazon's profits are from AWS. [businessinsider.com]
Anyway, for retails goods which are available for any company to sell, the profit margins are always slightly over the actual sales cost. This is because there is plenty of competition which will undercut on price very quickly if you raise your prices. Amazon has distribution, sales costs and volume advantages over most other companies, so they're able to price lower for most stuff. That doesn't mean they can ever raise their prices to anything higher than their next closest competitor's costs without being undercut in turn. They know that, so they keep their prices lower than the competition in order to keep their customer base.
Re: (Score:2)
Interestingly here in the UK Amazon seem to be using their own courier service almost exclusively for prime orders, with the result that they usually arrive with one delivery guy even if they are sent in multiple shipments.
Re: (Score:2)
That may be true, but the president has other duties more important than delivery truck driver.
Re: Time for oompa loompa delivery (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: Time for oompa loompa delivery (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
1. venturing out of the comfort of the basement.
2. having to be outdoors even if briefly.
3. the potential hazard of being exposed to sunlight, unless picking up at night.
4. the necessity of wearing clothing.
5. needing to have some minimum level of personal hygene.
Opting for delivery allows one to experience the excitement of tracking the shipment, and updating the tracking page every 60 seconds.