UK supermarkets roll-out further robo-delivery trials
Delivery boom
Like many other retailers, Co-op has ramped up its online offer to meet demand, particularly during the pandemic. It aims to offer online home delivery and click and collect, through its own site and with partners, at over 1,000 stores by the end of this year. This is up from the 650 it had originally planned.
The company says it sees its stores as “micro-distribution hubs,” with orders picked from local Co-op stores so high street stores benefit from any increase in online demand.
Starship Technologies’ robots have completed over 500,000 commercial autonomous deliveries in local neighborhoods and university campuses across five countries, traveling over one million autonomous miles in total, the company said. A statement added that delivery numbers for Co-op products have tripled in Milton Keynes during the Covid-19 crisis.
Rules of the pavement
A Starship spokesperson toldCities Today: “The pandemic has accelerated our growth, and we’ll be expanding into new towns and cities soon.”
They said that where their services run: “We have agreements in place with local governments to operate our robots.”
Robot deliveries are also being piloted elsewhere. In July,Amazon announcedtrials of its electric, autonomous Scout package delivery robots in Atlanta, Georgia, and Franklin, Tennessee, adding to services inSnohomish County, Washington, andIrvine, California. For most cities, though, this is still an emerging area, and with street and pavement space at a premium, leaders will be keen to avoid the disruption seen around the world in the early days of micromobility.
In July, Eric Stuckey, City Administrator, City of Franklin,toldCities Todaythat the Amazon pilot would start small and allow the city to “go to school” and learn what regulations might work best if the system were to be scaled up.
In 2017, San Francisco, which was a front-runner for these services,passed regulationsto govern the use of delivery robots after complaints from some residents. The city has sinceestablished an Office of Emerging Technologyto engage earlier with companies that want to deploy innovative new systems and products – the home page features an image of a delivery robot.
In other robot uses, Singapore piloted a four-legged, dog-like robot called Spot topromote social distancingin parks, and Seoul is using small humanoid robots todeliver digital skills trainingto senior citizens.
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Story byCities Today
Cities Today is the leading news platform on urban mobility and innovation, reaching an international audience of city leaders.Cities Today is the leading news platform on urban mobility and innovation, reaching an international audience of city leaders.
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