Cargobike of the Year 2021: Broad Participation, High Innovation
With a record participation, the "International Cargobike of the Year" Award (CABOTY) is starting a new round. After the event planned for last year's International Cargo Bike Festival in Nijmegen had to be canceled due to the pandemic, the editorial team of HUSS-VERLAG is now using the stage of the 2nd National Bicycle Logistics Conference from September 28-29 in Frankfurt to scrutinize and evaluate the innovations of the booming industry. The event of the Bicycle Logistics Association Germany RLVD, which is expected to attract 150 participants and 30 exhibitors, is considered the meeting of the scene par excellence this year. It is accompanied by an intensive program of practical excursions, lectures, and discussions. Among other things, Frankfurt's goods tram project with cargo bike manufacturer ONOMOTION will be presented, micro depots of city logistics providers such as DHL, UPS, SaR, and CityLog will be inspected, and a charging station by Swobbee specially designed for bicycle logistics will be visited.
“With modern e-cargo bikes and the right logistics system, we can replace many diesel transporters in urban logistics. For this, we need micro depots close to the city center for goods transshipment and bike infrastructure also for large commercial cargo bikes,” explains RLVD Chairman Tom Assmann.
Parallel to this, the CABOTY competition is running, which is to be ceremoniously awarded on the evening of bicycle logistics on September 28. In the categories "Light," "Heavy," and "Trailer," the new products will be judged and evaluated by the jury in a brief testing procedure. Compared to the first event in 2019 in Groningen, jury chairman Johannes Reichel notes a significant professionalization of the products, particularly in the area of heavy cargo bikes, where a lot has happened, and a fruitful competition for the best solutions is emerging.
These should also be economically viable, specifically robust and less prone to repairs for bike logisticians, and ecology is already presumed in this area, continued the jury chairman. For cargo bikes to exert their effectiveness, an adjusted framework in traffic infrastructure and traffic regulations is also necessary. Many of the bikes, as they currently stand, are hardly feasible on bike paths at higher frequencies, says Reichel. The new means of transport only makes sense in combination with micro depots. These must be provided by the cities in an unbureaucratic manner and without high costs.
"The increasingly urgent 'traffic transition' is unthinkable without a 'logistics transition'. I am therefore very pleased that we can welcome the National Bike Logistics Conference as a marketplace for information, innovation, and networking here in Frankfurt am Main this year," says Frankfurt’s Head of Traffic Stefan Majer, who will open the 2nd National Bike Logistics Conference on September 28 at the Gutleut depot of the Frankfurt Transport Company (VGF).
On the actual conference day, September 29, a panel under RLVD chairman Tom Assmann will start the day, which will be opened by Tarek Al-Wazir, Hesse's Minister for Economy, Energy, Transport, and Housing. Steffen Bilger, State Secretary of the Federal Ministry of Transport and Digital Infrastructure, will also join in for a welcoming address. The keynote speech "Status Quo and Perspectives of Bike Logistics" will be delivered by Prof. Kai-Oliver Schocke from the Frankfurt University of Applied Sciences, which is also the venue for the Cargo Bike Award. The lectures will then cover topics such as micro depot concepts, containerization, pharma logistics with cargo bikes, women in the cargo bike sector, AI-based bike routing, intermodal combinations with cargo bikes, and above all answering the question: "Why bike logistics saves city centers".
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