Japan’s government is planning to connect major cities with automated zero-emission logistics links that can quietly and efficiently move millions of tons of cargo while taking tens of thousands of trucks off the road.
According to The Japan News, the project has been under discussion since February by a panel of experts from the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism.
A draft of an interim report was released a few days ago revealing plans to complete an initial link between Tokyo and Osaka by 2034.
The country expects that around 30% of parcels will simply not get from point A to point B by 2030, because there will be no one to transport them.
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Hence this logistics link that will allow as much small cargo to be moved between Tokyo and Osaka as 25,000 trucks.
Operations
According to the report, each pallet will be able to carry up to one ton of small cargo items and will move without human interference from one end to the other.
One possibility is to use giant conveyor belts to cover the 500-kilometer (310-mile) distance between the two cities, running along the highway or, potentially, through tunnels under the road.
Alternatively, the infrastructure could simply provide flat lanes or tunnels, and pallets could be moved by automated electric carts.
One of the points the report makes is that a 500-kilometer tunnel would be costly, at around $23 billion before factoring in conveyor belts or autonomous carts
The project start date is 2034, and given the current state of driverless technology, it certainly seems very plausible that we will have autonomous vehicles on the roads in large numbers by then.
