The London Boroughs Consolidation Centre (LBCC) has named DHL as its long-term freight partner at the Freight in the City Expo last week.

The project, led by Camden along with Enfield, Waltham Forest and Islington, was given the green light back in March after a successful trial period which saw DHL manage its consolidation site in Edmonton.

Speaking to attendees at Alexandra Palace, representative for Camden Council and Green Lane Logistics Nigel Symonds said that DHL was the best choice out of many candidates for the contract.

Symonds said: “We had a public sector procurement exercise and they were the best bid. They have been doing the trial, but they won the contract through a separate procurement exercise when they scored higher than the other bidders.”

The centre’s trial spanned from January 2014 to April 2015, and in March this year councillor Theo Blackwell, cabinet member for finance and technology policy at Camden, told Motortransport.co.uk that it had “seen 50,000 items delivered to over 250 council buildings so far, leading to a 46% reduction in the number of vehicle trips and a 45% reduction in kilometres travelled”.

Symonds said that he hopes to scale up the operation further now it is entering “business as usual” operation. “We’re looking forward to the next three plus one years with DHL, and we want to really scale up the operation.

“It needs volume, it needs more organisations and retailers to join and we don’t just want it to be a public sector for council goods. The way that we think it will be successful is to incorporate private sector."

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