For 25 years, my dad delivered packages for UPS in one of the company’s classic, boxy, brown trucks. His route included the neighborhood where I grew up, and I have fond memories of being able to hear his truck rumble down our street.
My dad never would have heard me coming on Tuesday. That’s a good thing, for the environment at least.
For the first time, Amazon invited journalists to test drive its electric delivery vehicles — a much greener and quieter substitute to the gas-powered box trucks and vans still used by a variety of delivery companies, including Amazon.
The EVs are made in partnership with Rivian, the California-based automaker that also produces electric pickup trucks and SUVs. Amazon first partnered with Rivian in 2019, and has since invested heavily in the company.
Amazon now has more than 10,000 Rivian vans on the road across 1,800 U.S. cities, and has delivered more than 260 million packages. The vans have been spotted more frequently around Seattle. Amazon plans to have 100,000 of the vehicles on the road by 2030 as part of The Climate Pledge and its effort to become carbon neutral by 2040.
“We think we’ve built the best delivery vehicle that’s ever been built,” said Matt Norman, director of fleet technology and business development at Amazon.
As the company scales electric delivery quickly, Norman said that Amazon will continue to gather feedback from drivers who use the vans every day.
“We’re going to continue to find ways to make this even better,” he said. “Maybe today will be the spark for another interesting innovation.”
Inside the cab and cargo area
I don’t know if I was ready to spark any innovation for Amazon and Rivian, but I’ve driven plenty of vehicles over the years and I know what I like and what feels good on the road.
Before leaving the parking lot at Amazon’s delivery station warehouse south of Seattle in Tukwila, I got a tour of the cab and cargo area of the van from Kevin Lennox, head of Amazon’s vehicle engineering and technology team.
The first step, literally, is getting in the thing, and Rivian made it easy with a step that’s built into the curbside entryway. The cab is mostly no frills, as you’d expect any cargo delivery van to be. There are blue Amazon accents among the grey interior, matching the colors on vests or jackets you sometimes see delivery drivers wearing.
The “dashboard” features two good-size screens. One shows a navigation map, speed, etc. The other features a more robust set of controls for temperature, cameras, music, windows, doors and more. A map on this screen shows all of the driver’s delivery stops, and is integrated with an Amazon-supplied smartphone that drivers use to record package data.
Lennox called the screens a huge improvement over other delivery vehicles on the market.
“If you got into an older van of ours, generally you’re going to have to use your phone to actually see your maps,” he said. “It’s all integrated here onto the screen, so the driver can just put their phone down and they can see where their next stop is.”
There’s also a third-party, AI-equipped camera mounted inside the windshield to monitor workers in the name of improved safety. The devices from Netradyne, called Driver-i, made news — and sparked privacy concerns — when Amazon started installing them in delivery vehicles in February 2021 to monitor such things as distracted driving.
The coolest feature in the cab is the bulkhead door that accesses the cargo area. Any memory I have of my dad’s UPS truck and the opening/slamming of a heavy, metal, sliding door was eclipsed by the whisper-quiet, Star Trek-inspired door on this Rivian van, which opened with the push of a touchscreen button. It also opens automatically when the van is put in park.
Maybe that’s why a driver once told me that he felt like he was driving a spaceship.
The cargo area is well lit by LED lights, and the passageway between the bright white shelving for boxes is plenty wide. There are panels along the ceiling with reflective insulation to keep the inside of the package area from getting baked.
The back cargo door opens with another button push, and there’s an easy step down to street level.
On the road
I’ve driven a number of electric vehicles for GeekWire tests, including big trucks, a luxury Lucid sedan, a Ford F-150 Lightning, and a zippy Porsche Taycan like Bill Gates supposedly owns. The Amazon van had a mix of the driving qualities that those vehicles all possess, with the biggest being how quiet it is.
The diesel-fueled rumble of your run-of-the-mill box truck is gone, and that makes for a pleasant experience behind the wheel — and behind the truck, since you don’t have to suck on its exhaust.
The touchscreen controls are easy to reach and navigate through. There are heated seats and a heated steering wheel for added comfort. I managed to turn on the windshield wipers during a light drizzle.
It took me several stops to begin to get used to the energy saving regenerative braking. This system works by reversing the electric motors that propel a vehicle, according to the U.S. Dept. of Energy.
My instinct after more than 35 years of driving traditional cars was to let off the gas and apply the brake. That’s not necessary in the Rivian. Let off the gas and feel yourself lurch forward in your seat is more like it. It’s the same feeling drivers get in a Tesla or other EVs, and perhaps just felt extra aggressive in a big cargo van.
The van — empty of any package load — did accelerate nicely and felt completely smooth and comfortable driving 45 mph on Airport Way South. Cameras mounted on the exterior of the van provide a good view of other cars on the road behind and alongside the van, and I could see how they’d be useful when making deliveries and trying to park on congested streets.
After 20 minutes I found myself daydreaming, not of becoming an Amazon delivery driver, but of having one of the vans for a personal roadtrip.
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