What are Japan's 'conveyor belt roads' to tackle driver shortages?

In recent decades, Japan has achieved significant strides in robotics, computing, and transportation.

Now, the country is aiming higher as it plans to build an automated cargo transport corridor between the capital city of Tokyo and Osaka

The automated cargo transport corridor is being created in an effort to address Japan’s truck driver problem as the country’s population ages.

Here’s all we know about it.

The conveyor belt road

A computer graphics video made by the government shows big, wheeled boxes moving along a three-lane corridor, also called an “auto flow road,” in the middle of a big highway.

A trial system is due to start test runs in 2027 or early 2028, aiming for full operations by the mid-2030s. The amount of funding for the project is not yet set but it is seen as one way to help the country cope with soaring deliveries.

The loading will be automated using forklifts and coordinated with airports, railways and ports.

Yuri Endo, a senior deputy director overseeing the effort at the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism said, “We need to be innovative with the way we approach roads. The key concept of the auto flow-road is to create dedicated spaces within the road network for logistics, utilising a 24-hour automated and unstaffed transport system."

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Apart from making up for a shrinking labour force and the need to reduce workloads for drivers, the system also would help cut carbon emissions, she said.

She added, “The key concept of the auto flow road is to create dedicated spaces within the road network for logistics, utilising a 24-hour automated and unmanned transportation system.”

The system, which is also intended for business deliveries, may be expanded to other routes if all goes well. Human drivers may still have to do last-mile deliveries to people’s doors, although driverless technology may be used in the future.

The plan may sound like a solution that would only work in relatively low-crime, densely populated societies like Japan, not sprawling nations like the US.

However, similar ideas are being considered in Switzerland and Great Britain. The plan in Switzerland involves an underground pathway, while the one being planned in London will be a fully automated system running on low-cost linear motors.

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Labour shortage

Japan’s shortage of truck drivers is worsening due to laws that went into effect earlier this year that limit the amount of overtime drivers can log. The move aims to avoid overwork and accidents and to make the jobs tolerable.

Around 1,000 people have died each year as a result of delivery trucks colliding with cars in recent years.

Although it is better than the roughly 2,000 fatalities that occurred in 2010, the Trucking Association, which represents around 400 trucking companies and organisations nationwide, wants to make deliveries even safer. The group also encourages customers to combine their orders or postpone delivery orders.

Industry insiders and the government claim this is a “2024 problem.”

According to the Japan Trucking Association, trucks account for nearly all (more than 91 per cent) of the approximately 4.3 billion tonnes of domestic transport capacity. That is only a small portion of what is happening in a large nation like the United States.

According to South China Morning Post which cited Yuji Yano, a professor at Ryutsu Keizai University, “That means the 2024 problem isn’t just a transport problem but really a people’s problem."

Furthermore, according to government predictions, Japan’s total transport capacity is expected to decline by 34 per cent by 2030.

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Declining population

According to government data, the number of Japanese families using online shopping increased from about 40 per cent to over 60 per cent during the pandemic, despite the country’s population continuing to decline due to a lowering birth rate.

According to new government figures, the number of Japanese people 65 and older reached an astounding 36.25 million in 2024, making up 29.3 per cent of the country’s total population.

According to the National Institute of Population and Social Security Research, older people will account for 34.8 per cent of the population by 2040.

With inputs from agencies