Apcoa to turn car parks into distribution centres

Apcoa wants to turn its European network of car parks into distribution centres, where parcels are put into cargo bikes for deliveries in city centres. These should profit from a reduction in congestion and pollution.

Transloading stations

The German company wants to extend a successful test in Stuttgart to a full-blown European concept next year. The test, in collaboration with research institute Fraunhofer and bike courier Velocarrier, reserved a number of parking spaces for containers for online orders. These were then delivered by cargo bike, eliminating the need for larger vans for the ‘last mile’ in the often narrow streets of many European city centres, German Heise online writes.

Apcoa manages over 8000 car parks with 1.4 million parking spaces in twelve European countries. These include car parks in city centres, near airports and near major shopping centres.