Polis at the policy session of the Urban logistics Summer School (Uni of Antwerp)

The students of the Summerschool on Urban Logistics at the Universiteit Antwerpen - Faculteit Bedrijfswetenschappen en Economie got involved in an exchange with experts from the field. Giacomo Lozzi (Polis Network), Stefan Bottu (VIL), Patrick Vermeulen (GLS Belgium), Jasper Van Den Berghen (Departement Mobiliteit en Openbare Werken - Vlaamse overheid) and Steven Van Den Bosch (DHL Express België) took part in the debate.

Different topics were discussed by the experts, through an interactive exchange with the summer school participants.

In particular, it was discussed how cities can involve operators in the definition of a more effective and harmonised regulation. This presupposes the sharing of some principles of environmental, social and economic sustainability between the public and private sectors, collaborative spirit, and incentives and nudges by local authorities to promote virtuous behavior and the use of low emission vehicles, such as cargo bikes and electric vans and trucks.

As for the use of shared infrastructure (micro-hubs, parcel lockers, etc.) and the sharing of data on logistics flows by operators, they have already expressed their availability and in some cases even implemented great examples of cooperation, for example in the context of the Flanders Logistics Institute (VIL) projects. However, there is a need for an independent third party, such as the local authority supported by the academic sector, which can play a key role by storing and processing data guaranteeing anonymity and privacy, and which dedicates space and infrastructure (scarce and expensive in inner cities) to urban logistics.