The partners plan to deliver packages to Manhattan by ferry to ease truck congestion in tunnels and bridges.

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Authors: Jack Ewing and Winnie Hu

People living in Manhattan will soon be able to transport their yoga mats, air fryer, and game consoles by ferry.

A New York lawyer and a British electric cargo bike manufacturer, encouraged by UPS, proposed to re-use the Manhattan Wharf as a cargo passage, bypassing the residents of bridges and tunnels that have become more and more crowded because trucks and lorries carry cargo.

Lawyer William Wachtel and Fernhay, a British company that develops urban parcel delivery systems, announced their plans on Wednesday. He is also the chairman of the company that operates the Manhattan Heliport along the East River.

Starting in the spring, if all goes well, a dedicated ferry will store the packaged containers at the heliport. The containers are then transported to drop-off points around Manhattan in light trailers, preferably by electric vehicles. From there, the courier company will use battery-powered trolleys or cargo bikes to distribute packages.

The idea of ​​using seaside freight is not new. Manhattan was once a global port of entry for prosperous goods such as cotton, iron or grain. But in the last century, waterborne cargo has almost disappeared, replaced by trucks and truck convoys, which climb over bridges and through tunnels that connect Manhattan to the rest of the area.

During the coronavirus pandemic, reducing climate change emissions and congestion caused by transport trucks has become more urgent. As e-commerce flourishes, traffic in New York City has skyrocketed, putting more trucks on the road and sending them more and more to residential areas.

According to reports, truck traffic at six major intersections from New Jersey to New York City - including the George Washington Bridge and Lincoln and Holland Tunnel - increased from 620,150 trucks in the same month of 2019 before the pandemic to 638,725 in September Trucks, Port Authority of New York and New Jersey reportedly operating border crossings.

The New York plan is based on similar plans elsewhere, including Dublin, which was developed by Fernhay in cooperation with package delivery giant UPS.

UPS trucks deliver packages to so-called micro-distribution centers near Dublin city centre. The narrow four-wheeled Fernhay vehicles are called eQuads and are powered by a combination of battery and human pedal power to deliver packages to their destinations.

Colm Ennis, a senior executive engineer at the city's Ministry of Environment and Transport, said the Dublin system accounted for a relatively small percentage of deliveries there.

"It hasn't changed the rules of the game," Mr. Ennis said. But he added that any flow reduction is welcome, and Fernhay systems are putting pressure on UPS's competitors to reduce their contribution to flow and emissions.

"The place where it has a greater impact is to make other companies think about what they are doing," Mr. Ennis said.

UPS has pledged to reduce its net greenhouse gas emissions to zero by 2050, and it has already used bicycles extensively in Europe. According to Peter Harris, UPS's vice president of international sustainable development, for example, in Munich, most of the deliveries in the city center are done by bicycles.

But he said that most of the cargo bikes currently available are not strong enough for UPS, prompting the company to cooperate with Fernhay to develop vehicles that suit its needs.

eQuads and battery-powered trolleys that can be driven on the sidewalk are designed to carry a standardized box containing a large number of packages. These boxes are loaded in a central distribution center, reducing the amount of processing required to deliver ovens or home furnishing suits to customers in the city center. They are smaller versions of the containers that have been used to transport international cargo for decades.

"A few years ago, shipping containers completely changed the shipping industry," Mr. Harris said. "The smaller containers we are talking about here may revolutionize urban logistics."

In New York, it is planned to build a special New York waterway ferry to transport loaded containers from the cargo terminals in Bayonne, New Jersey and Red Hook, Brooklyn to the heliport in downtown Manhattan. Mr. Wachtel is the founding partner of Wachtel Missry, a Manhattan company, and he is the chairman of Saker Aviation, which operates the heliport in downtown Manhattan. He is also an investor in Fernhay.

In the heliport, the mini-containers will be loaded on trailers and transported around the city, where they will be transferred to battery-powered trolleys for delivery. Robin Haycock, Fernhay's co-founder and senior automotive engineer, said that eQuad bicycles will be rarely used in New York. "Manhattan is more suitable for walkers," he said.

He said that Fernhay and Mr. Wachtel do not seek public funds to fund the project, they only need to obtain routine approval from the municipality to start operations. Although UPS has a positive attitude towards the project, it has not made a commitment.

"We are exploring the feasibility of bringing this model from European cities to the United States," UPS spokesperson Lawrence Pangle said in an email.

The partners hope to attract other customers such as FedEx, Amazon and IKEA. Mr. Wachter said that to transform the heliport into a receiving ferry, "all you have to do is float on the barge."

On Wednesday afternoon, at a press conference held at Pier 79 in Manhattan, city officials announced that they would renew their efforts to reduce the city’s reliance on truck traffic and promote a more sustainable freight system to develop a ferry freight plan.

At the press conference, Mayor Bill de Blasio took a photo with a Fernhay eQuad with the UPS logo on the side. "This thing is surprisingly spacious," he said.

According to transportation experts, by 2045, New York City’s total freight volume is expected to reach 540 million tons per year, up from 365 million tons today—most of which are transported by truck.

In response, city officials have taken measures such as promoting off-hours truck delivery, expanding community loading areas, and working with e-commerce and shipping companies including Amazon and DHL to use cargo bikes as an alternative to delivery trucks.

Sarah M. Kaufman, deputy director of New York University’s Rudding Center for Transportation Policy and Management, said the city’s growing truck traffic makes its streets unsafe for pedestrians and cyclists. And it has exacerbated congestion and pollution.

Ms. Kaufman said that using ferries as an alternative is a wise, multi-pronged approach to the truck problem, which will only get worse even if people continue to shop online after the pandemic is over.

"Manhattan is an island, and we did not make the most of our waterfront," she said. "If we can reduce the amount of traffic on the streets and use our waterways more efficiently, we will see a range of benefits."

Kurt C. Schlichting, professor of sociology at Fairfield University and author of the book "Manhattan Waterfront" published in 2018, said that Manhattan’s prosperous population and factories helped its waterfront The district was transformed into a shipping, trade, and commercial center in the 1800s and early 1900s.

Ships brought machinery and steel for railway construction from Britain, sugarcane from the Caribbean, and cotton from the southern United States.

But Professor Schlichting added that this once bustling waterfront gradually declined, partly because trucks began to transport goods on highways, and Manhattan’s crowded piers and streets were not suitable for the industry’s transition to container transportation. Container transportation provided a better An effective means of transporting large metal cargo boxes.

Professor Schlichting said that he liked the idea of ​​shipping goods back to Manhattan's waterfront, but he questioned the feasibility of shipping large amounts of cargo to the waterfront, which is now crowded with entertainment users.

He said: “To reuse the waterfront for transporting goods, I think it’s difficult to keep up-in other words, all packages.”