Are you in the US? I’ve literally never seen a delivery driver on a bike, except for that action movie about bike couriers in NYC.
Are you in the US? I’ve literally never seen a delivery driver on a bike, except for that action movie about bike couriers in NYC.
BorgDrone@lemmy.one 1 week ago
No, I’m in the Netherlands. Why deliver by car when a bike is faster and cheaper?
greybeard@lemmy.one 1 week ago
Because it isn’t faster and cheaper in the majority of the US. The nearest Pizza place to me is about 2 miles, the nearest that actually delivers? About 4 miles. And I’m within the city limits of one of the top 20 largest cities in the US. Our population densities are on a completely different scale than the Netherlands. Not saying we have good city designs, but as it is, a bike would a terrible way to deliver food to me.
BorgDrone@lemmy.one 1 week ago
You’re saying that 6.5 kilometers by car would be faster than by bike in a city? In a car you’d be stuck in slow moving traffic or waiting for a traffic light like 80% of the time.
6.5km by bike would be like 20 minutes max, depending on city and time of day it would be 30-60 minutes by car.
greybeard@lemmy.one 1 week ago
That is correct, the median speed, as a rough guess, from the pizza place near my house, to my house, would be 35mph, including the 2 stoplights in the way. Assuming we had proper bike infrastructure(which we don’t); you’d be hard pressed to top the speed a car can go, and you would still have to stop frequently at lights, just like a car. And remember, that is the nearest place, not the only. And a small sub note, this area is not flat, at all. The gradient changes are brutal for bikes and they can’t sustain a decent constant speed. Well, at least before electric bikes.
I am not defending, in any way, America’s horrible car centric infrastructure. It is what we have though, and as a result, bike deliveries aren’t an option for the vast majority of America. Of course, when you leave the city, it gets worse.
Solemn@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 week ago
Our cities aren’t densely built up, except for New York. The actual urban area of most cities generally has far fewer people than the suburban metroplex surrounding it. 6.5km is literally larger than all of downtown Dallas, depending on how you define downtown.
Even our cities are designed for car travel, so unless it’s rush hour you’re still faster by car. Unless there’s a concert or other event happening, it doesn’t take nearly 20 minutes to traverse downtown Dallas in a car.
naeap@piefed.social 1 week ago
4 miles (approx. 6km?) would be 3mins by bike
Where is the problem?
In my city in Austria like 90% of the deliveries are done by bike/e-bike
There is even a platform/app where it's guaranteed to be delivered by bike.
How long do you thing does it take to bike a few kilometres?
Yeah, maybe your infrastructure isn't bike friendly, but that's a problem that can be solved.
I just don't get the mentally of "well, it is that way and everything else can't apply here"
greybeard@lemmy.one 1 week ago
And here, it can be as little a 6 minutes by car, assuming good light timing, and a max of 15 minutes, assuming terrible timing and unusual traffic.
BURN@lemmy.world 1 week ago
Bike is not faster for a 20 mile delivery range
BorgDrone@lemmy.one 1 week ago
Who the fuck orders food 32 kilometers away? Who the fuck even delivers at that distance? You’d pay more for gas than for the food. Never mind that your food would be cold when it arrives.
I live in a small city in a rural area and I have like 150+ delivery restaurants within 5 kilometers. It wouldn’t even cross my mind to order from a restaurant in the next city over (not that they would accept it), let alone one 40 minutes away.
BURN@lemmy.world 1 week ago
The US. Our dominos served a 15-20 mile radius in my medium sized suburban town growing up.
greybeard@lemmy.one 1 week ago
Something else you seem to be missing is often, a lot Americans live off highways. 20 miles may only take 20 minutes of drive time. When I lived in slightly more rural area, most driving took almost exactly minute per mile. Our entire country is designed around vehicles moving at high speed. My city is wrapped in a 60 mile interstate. An unbroken loop around the city who’s speed limit is 70mph. Outside of rush hour, you can take it all the way around at 80mph without ever braking in the slightest, unless there is a slow moving car camping the passing lane.
Solemn@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 week ago
Pizza delivery has electronically heated insulated containers for the drivers to keep the pizza in during the drive. Generally I think they group up orders so one delivery driver will hit up maybe 10-20 deliveries in that one run. It’s normally not driving 20 miles just to deliver one pizza.