overnight deliveries

As a recent amazon prime member, i can attest to the convenience of one day deliveries.  It's been crucial for my proper car repairs of late.  BUT - at what cost?  not what I pay for it, but at what ecological and human cost?

There's an article recently published that tallies the # of drivers killed by the demands of rushing packages all over the place.  

'....In January, the 9-month-old was killed when a driver delivering Amazon.com packages crashed a 26-foot rented box truck into the back of her mother’s Jeep. The baby was strapped into a car seat in the back..
But Amazon’s promise of speedy delivery has come at a price, one largely hidden from public view. An investigation by ProPublica identified more than 60 accidents since June 2015 involving Amazon delivery contractors that resulted in serious injuries, including 10 deaths. That tally is most likely a fraction of the accidents that have occurred: Many people don’t sue, and those who do can’t always tell when Amazon is involved, court records, police reports and news accounts show....'


Ok - so maybe that's also true with other delivery services - heck even with Uber and Lyft drivers trying to keep their 5 star rathings.  But there's also a big environmental impact of all those diesel engines spewing aldehydes and carcinogens into the air alongside USPS, Fed Ex, UPS and other duplicate delivery trucks.  I mean, how many delivery services do we really need??

In 'normal' times I can forgo the instant gratification of one day delivery and opt for 'free shipping' that takes 5-7 days to the post office.  At least that way, a truck is not driving a little cardboard box all the way to my house, but instead the USPS truck is delivering the little box along with hundreds of others to a central 'warehouse' (aka as a post office building). And then there's the added savings of my not driving solo to a retail store and buying the item there with all the eco issues of a shopping trip.  But still...




'....Last September Amazon announced it was arranging for contractors to lease 20,000 cargo vans emblazoned with its logo. At the same time, the company has been fighting to keep other parts of its delivery force anonymous.
When the planning board of the Boston suburb Braintree passed zoning rules requiring that delivery vehicles serving a new Amazon warehouse there be labeled as part of the company’s delivery network, Amazon sued, saying the signage demands were unreasonable.
The lack of labeling can make it difficult for people outside Amazon to know the scope of the harm attributable to collisions, or for those injured to hold Amazon accountable. ...'

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