Express via subway.

[CSSHEGEWISCH]

The freight tunnels started losing business in the 1920's when delivery of goods by truck became practical.  The boring of the State Street and Dearborn Street subways at the same level in the 1940's didn't help either.  Toward the end, the only regular traffic in the tunnels was hauling furnace ashes away from several buildings that still had coal-fired furnaces.

Some of the tunnels are still in use as utility conduits.

[54light15]

Scenes from the 1950 film "Union Station" with William Holden are filmed in the Chicago freight tunnels. Fascinating stuff.

[Paul Chi]

In the early 1900s, there was a Chicago Tunnel Company (see Wiki) that ran a narrow gauge railway under the city for delivery of coal and merchandise. Those tunnels are still there, but now sealed after a disastrous 1992 flood where they passed under the Chicago River. Measureless ambition, those folks had.

[54light15]

I've seen the VW plant in Dresden, Germany that uses freight streetcars for parts delivery and taking finished cars out of the plant to the main train yard for loading. The plant is in a park-like area I was told that the city would only allow the plant to be built there if they used the street railway as they didn't want large trucks in the area. It was interesting, seeing the streetcar tracks branching off into the plant.

[CandOforprogress2]

Interurban and Trolley Freight were common in the 1920s with mail and express cars. Trucks and Roads did not have the weight cappasity yet

[daveklepper]

During WWII Boston Elevated used streetcars for newspaper delivery, including service tracks not used by revenue passenger cars.  Prior to the GM iownership but after the Metropolitan Railway breakup, New York Railways had double-truck side-door motorized box cars for department-sotre delivery.    Then there was VW in one German city for parts delivery.

[CSSHEGEWISCH]

It sounds like an idea that was caused more by congestion than a driver shortage.  Most cities in the United States do not have an extensive rapid transit system so it might not be too practical in the United States.

[Buslist]

Todays edition of the TV show Japan Railway Journal noted that one of Japan's largest express package delivery services I don't know their name but their logo is a black cat. Their delivery trucks, black and yellow IIRC, are a common sight in Japan. Due to a driver shortage they are experimenting with using the subway to move packages in the city. The short video showed a container about the size of a food tray container being loaded onto a train. The piece went on to say that the safety and economics are being evaluated. 

BTW if your cable system carries this show it is well worth your time. The major topic today was the recovery efforts on the Kyushu's Railways after last spring's quake!