The UK’s ambitious climate goals require urgent action across various sectors, with road freight being a primary focus due to its significant carbon emissions. The Department for Transport’s “Decarbonising Road Freight, Servicing, and Deliveries” toolkit provides essential guidance for local authorities to implement strategies that reduce emissions, improve air quality, and optimise urban delivery systems. FLOX.is, a leader in logistics technology, is uniquely positioned to help councils meet these objectives with tools that enhance delivery efficiency, reduce congestion, and support zero-emission initiatives.
In this blog, we explore how FLOX aligns with the Department for Transport’s toolkit, offering innovative solutions to decarbonise logistics and make urban areas cleaner and safer.
The Department for Transport’s toolkit outlines several key strategies for local authorities to decarbonise road freight. These include:
Each of these objectives aims to reduce carbon emissions, improve air quality, and alleviate traffic congestion, especially in urban centres. Local councils play a critical role in driving these changes by implementing and promoting policies that support sustainable freight logistics. FLOX provides the technological foundation needed to achieve these goals, supporting councils in their efforts to create healthier, more liveable cities.
FLOX offers a range of technologies specifically designed to assist local authorities in decarbonising logistics and delivery systems. With capabilities in fleet management, real-time tracking, and data-driven route optimisation, FLOX equips councils with the tools needed to address both immediate environmental targets and long-term sustainability.
By implementing FLOX’s solutions, local authorities can confidently tackle each of the toolkit’s focus areas, ensuring they meet the UK’s climate goals without compromising operational efficiency.
A core recommendation from the toolkit is for councils to decarbonise their fleets and encourage private operators to do the same. FLOX’s fleet management tools enable local authorities to monitor vehicle emissions, fuel consumption, and maintenance schedules in real-time, allowing them to make informed decisions about which vehicles to replace with electric or zero-emission alternatives.
With FLOX’s analytics, councils can identify trends in fuel use and operational efficiency, gaining actionable insights that support carbon reduction across their fleets. This capability empowers local authorities to lead by example, setting a high standard for private operators within their jurisdictions. FLOX also supports the procurement of electric or zero-emission vehicles by providing a comprehensive cost-benefit analysis, helping councils assess the economic and environmental advantages of fleet replacement.
The toolkit emphasises the importance of supporting ZEV uptake by fleet operators. FLOX meets this need with tools that encourage the integration of electric and zero-emission vehicles. Its route optimisation software addresses common ZEV challenges, such as battery life management and route efficiency, ensuring that fleet operators can transition smoothly to ZEVs without compromising productivity.
Additionally, FLOX offers cost-benefit analysis features, enabling councils and fleet operators to assess the financial feasibility of ZEV adoption. By highlighting potential savings in fuel and maintenance, FLOX helps alleviate concerns over the cost of ZEV transition, encouraging broader adoption among private fleets.
Charging infrastructure remains a critical concern for local authorities aiming to support ZEVs. FLOX assists councils in planning and optimising charging station locations, using data on freight routes, peak hours, and vehicle types to inform decisions. This strategic approach maximises infrastructure efficiency and helps reduce congestion.
With predictive analytics, FLOX enables councils to plan robust, future-proof infrastructure tailored to local needs. If certain areas experience high delivery vehicle traffic, FLOX can help councils identify optimal locations for charging stations, ensuring convenient access for both council and private fleets. Councils can further streamline charging infrastructure by prioritising locations for ZEVs and managing demand through dynamic pricing, supported by FLOX’s data-driven insights.
Increasing delivery and collection efficiency is essential for reducing emissions and congestion. FLOX provides powerful tools to address several key strategies within this area, helping councils streamline logistics for environmental and operational benefits.
Retiming deliveries to avoid peak hours is a proven strategy for reducing congestion, enhancing safety, and lowering emissions. By shifting deliveries away from peak periods, councils can improve traffic flow, reduce fuel consumption, and create quieter streets. FLOX’s scheduling and optimisation tools enable local authorities and logistics providers to plan and monitor retimed deliveries effectively.
For example, councils can use FLOX to collaborate with logistics operators and establish flexible delivery windows, particularly in the early morning or late evening. The quiet operation of EVs opens up additional opportunities for off-peak deliveries without disturbing residents. FLOX can track the impact of retimed deliveries, providing councils with data on reduced congestion and improved fuel efficiency.
London’s success with retiming deliveries during the 2012 Olympics demonstrated the potential of this approach, and many businesses continue to apply it today. FLOX enables councils across the UK to replicate this success, empowering them to improve air quality and traffic safety while supporting logistical efficiency.
Dynamic kerbside management is an emerging approach to ease congestion and conflicts in high-demand loading areas. FLOX supports digitalised kerbside management, offering app-based systems that allow delivery vehicles to book kerbside spaces in advance. This approach ensures that delivery vehicles have reliable, legal access to kerbside spaces, reducing instances of double parking and illegal stops.
By integrating with fleet management systems, FLOX allows drivers to adjust delivery windows and manage loading times more effectively. Councils can also gather data on kerbside usage, enabling them to allocate loading spaces more strategically. For instance, loading bays could serve as delivery zones in the morning and transform into seating for cafes or restaurants later in the day. FLOX supports councils in implementing flexible kerbside policies that accommodate both delivery vehicles and public use while gathering data to refine these allocations over time.
Councils can also use FLOX to prioritise ZEVs at kerbside spaces, setting dynamic pricing models that encourage sustainable vehicle use. With FLOX’s tools, councils can enhance urban space efficiency, improve traffic flow, and reduce emissions caused by inefficient loading and unloading practices.
Pick-up and drop-off points (PUDOs) offer a sustainable solution for urban logistics by enabling residents to collect or return parcels at convenient locations, reducing the need for multiple home deliveries. FLOX supports councils in identifying optimal PUDO locations, managing concession contracts, and assessing the environmental impact of a PUDO network.
PUDOs are highly efficient for operators, reducing vehicle mileage and enabling drivers to deliver more parcels within a shorter timeframe. For example, Salford City Council’s partnership with InPost led to the installation of 65 parcel lockers, projected to save 910 tonnes of CO2 emissions annually. FLOX’s advanced mapping and analysis tools enable councils to establish PUDOs in optimal locations, such as libraries, community centres, and car parks, creating a dense network that serves multiple delivery providers.
Research suggests that PUDOs located within 250 metres of residents’ homes see higher usage rates, particularly in densely populated urban areas. FLOX helps councils plan agnostic networks that can be used by any delivery provider, maximising environmental benefits and ensuring that residents have convenient access to parcel collection services. With FLOX’s support, councils can reduce traffic congestion from delivery vehicles and improve last-mile delivery efficiency.
Business waste consolidation offers another impactful strategy for reducing emissions and vehicle trips. Individual businesses often manage their own waste collection, leading to multiple operators serving the same area and contributing to traffic congestion. FLOX provides councils with tools to promote voluntary waste consolidation, allowing businesses to share collection services and reduce vehicle frequency.
London’s Bond Street is a successful example of waste consolidation, where the number of waste operators was reduced from 47 to five, leading to a 93.7% reduction in CO2 emissions within a year. FLOX enables councils to analyse waste collection patterns, identify opportunities for consolidation, and facilitate joint tendering processes among local businesses. By promoting waste consolidation, councils can reduce traffic from waste collection vehicles, cut emissions, and support businesses in lowering costs through collective bargaining.
Business improvement districts (BIDs), property managers, and multi-tenant buildings are well-suited to initiate waste consolidation efforts, with FLOX providing data analysis and coordination support. Councils can use these insights to encourage sustainable waste collection practices, contributing to reduced traffic and improved air quality.
FLOX understands the challenges that local authorities face in implementing complex logistics strategies, often requiring collaboration across departments and the updating of traffic regulation orders (TROs). With FLOX’s comprehensive tools, councils can streamline this process, using data analytics to support decision-making and monitor policy impacts. By integrating FLOX technology into traffic and travel management systems, councils can confidently adopt and assess innovative solutions for delivery and collection optimisation.
With FLOX, local authorities can implement and monitor dynamic kerbside management, PUDO networks, retimed deliveries, and waste consolidation initiatives more effectively. These tools not only improve delivery efficiency but also enhance councils’ ability to meet environmental objectives and create safer, cleaner, more accessible urban spaces.
As local authorities strive to meet the Department for Transport’s decarbonisation objectives, FLOX provides an essential partnership in achieving these goals. FLOX’s technology offers comprehensive, scalable solutions that enable councils to implement the toolkit’s recommended strategies with confidence and precision. Through retimed deliveries, dynamic kerbside management, PUDO points, and business waste consolidation, FLOX empowers councils to transform logistics systems, reduce emissions, and alleviate congestion.
Local authorities committed to improving the efficiency and sustainability of freight logistics can rely on FLOX to provide the expertise, tools, and insights needed to achieve tangible results. By embracing these innovations, councils can lead the way in sustainable urban logistics, supporting cleaner, safer, and more liveable cities for future generations.