UPS drivers may soon give bicycle messengers a run for their money.

Delivering goods to people at work and home can be logistically challenging in urban areas, where crowded streets and little to no parking offer few options for drivers looking for curbside access to buildings.

So says UPS, which contracted with researcher GreenBiz to study the challenges of moving goods around urban settings, and more importantly, to devise solutions.

Those fixes need to address both the congestion and pollution, which will only increase as more people find themselves living in urban settings, where about half of the world's population already reside, according to a recent report from the United Nations.