| June 17, 2008 A new type of project in Cambridge, Mass.
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(Peter Howe, NECN) - Wenzday Jane runs a delivery company in Boston, Massachusetts. Even though she does a lot of business distributing organic fruits and vegetables to people who live downtown, you will never hear her complain about parking tickets, or even about the $4 dollar and climbing gas.
Why? She is the fuel for her delivery truck. A special pedal-powered van that can carry up to 700 pounds. Her company, New Amsterdam Project, is based in Cambridge and makes deliveries through Boston and adjacent towns. They are six months old with a fleet of five bike vans.
Jane: We are getting busier and busier everyday. Over the last three to four months, our business has increased by 100% from what we were doing in February.
Food retailer Boston Organics uses New Amsterdam for about sixty of its 1, 200 weekly deliveries.
Jeff Barry of Boston Organics: It has always been a goal of mine to do things as environmentally sustainable as possible and when I learned about New Amsterdam Project I was very excited.
Barry is happy to pay a little extra for human-powered delivery.
The delivery trucks cost $5,000 dollars and are imported from England. Plus $4,500 for an added electric motor to help the rider get from zero to about 7MPH.
New Amsterdam hopes to expand.
Lane: I don't think we've even scratched the surface yet of the demand, the potential demand just in the city of Boston and the Greater Boston area.
Jane says
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