Have you ever had the situation that you got like crazy when you needed to get somewhere urgently, but then –all of a surprise- you get stuck in a traffic jam, because it’s actually end of business hours, and the streets are crowded with commuters? And besides these people – where do all these trucks come from waiting like you? That’s actually the reason why I prefer to go by bicycle everywhere possible.
I assume all of you have had similar situations already, irrespective of where you live. On the one hand, we are pretty much used to our comfortable way of living and high standards and don’t want to miss anything, but on the other hand, we also realize that this is not really the way we can and want to go forward.
Population analysts predict that more than half the world’s population will live in urban cities by 2020. And yet current city infrastructures are already struggling to meet current population levels and resulting traffic. Existing urban infrastructure has limited capacity and must be optimized to meet growing
demand, especially in mature markets.
I recently came across an interesting customer requirement. A manufacturing company has a multi-billion $ investment going on to build a new production facility, which will increase truck traffic to their site by just a bit more than 6%. They realized that they won’t have enough capacity to handle this additional
traffic at the gate, and also will run into issues as to optimally slotting goods issues. Do they now need to increase their own overflow parking? And what does this mean to the city infrastructure?
Optimizing traffic in these constrained conditions by exchanging information on the realistic expected time of arrival, waiting times to be expected, as well as space capacity of 3rd party parking space providers will result better predictability as well as less wasted time and in the end be a win-win for everyone
involved.
There’s huge potential in this topic – and if it’s done right, this may actually really help making the world better for all of us. The better air due to less traffic jams will even make my bicycling more enjoyable.This is a call to everyone involved in these kinds of infrastructure challenges: break the silos, start interacting with each other, and leverage innovative solutions like SAP Networked Logistics Hub . This newly released cloud solution allows companies, institutions, and individuals dealing with ever-increasing time pressure and growth constraints to gain greater, real-time visibility into their complete business network, irrespective of whether they have a direct business relation with each other or not. SAP Networked Logistics Hub merges real-time location data from the various parties of a logistics hub in one place and allows them to communicate efficiently to result in high cost efficiencies. Shorter waiting times for pickup and delivery, better utilization of existing physical infrastructures and less traffic delays help building responsive supply chains to meet real-time demand. Please find more details on sap.com.
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