NEW YORK (PIX11) -- New York City depends on truck deliveries, which adds to congestion and pollution.
The city's Department of Transportation announced it will allocate $6 million to businesses that sign up for evening and overnight deliveries to combat it.
Alex Ziyed has owned Soho Grocery for almost 20 years. Demand is always high, and he needs to restock constantly.
“We get one or two deliveries a day,” Ziyed said.
Business owners we spoke to this evening are concerned about a couple of things: safety. They believe authorities need to do much more to guarantee their goods won’t disappear in the middle of the night.
“We get quite a bit. It is in the double-digit numbers,” said Ardijan Hasan.
According to the New York City Department of Transportation, 90% of goods get delivered by trucks.
“When businetryrying to do deliveries on peak hours, it doesn’t work for anyone. Our streets are all congested,” said Ydanis Rodriguez adding that the $6 million will assist “businesses to help them transition to off-hour deliveries between 7 p.m. to 6 a.m.”
The incentive will fund some work, such as retrofitting building security for unattended deliveries and additional safety equipment, such as security cameras. However, some business owners don’t think that would be enough.
“We do have security cameras all the time, but sometime it s is not enough; if they promise us to maybe bring more cops and be safe,” said Ziyed.
Owners will receive a one-time payment to assist with the shift, and the incentive is open to businesses of all sizes.
“There’s quite a few positives when it comes to reducing congestion and simplifying things,” Ardijan Hasan added.
And for all the business owners watching who are interested in signing up, there will be webinars held virtually on June 3 and 10. You can sign up by visiting ohdnyc.com.
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