Potential of Warehouse Sharing and Electric Bicycles Deliveries in the Montreal Region

City logistics has become more important over the years as a greater share of the world's population lives in urban areas. This is especially true in an area of increasing use of e-commerce and greater awareness of the need to reduce transportation externalities to combat global warming. In this paper, we evaluate the potential for reducing costs and CO2 emissions in the courier delivery industry by sharing warehouses between different delivery companies. We also consider a greater use of cargo bikes (CBs), which are more mobile and eco-friendlier. We test a cost reduction optimization model on data for the delivery of courier in the metropolitan area of Montreal, Canada. Results show a cost and GHG emissions reduction (of over 30%) when warehouses are shared between different courier companies and when CBs are used. We define a ratio between the maximum distance between a pickup or delivery site and the depot (warehouse) used and the total distance travelled. Results show that such a ratio has a significant impact on the gains brought using CBs. The maximum speed of vehicles also has a significant impact on the results.