Packages tend to be more patient than passengers. I'd expect that if someone builds a medium range (or long range) goods transport it will focus on cheap throughput, not on latency. Low latency at any cost use cases would remain the realm of couriers (and/or drones). Short range, things might look different. Urban-scale pneumatic pipe systems had been a thing before fax machines took over. But a last mile package delivery network would likely have more in common with an airport luggage conveyor graph than with hyperloop fantasies.
There is huge demand for hourly package delivery. I’d imagine Amazon would spend quite a bit on it like they tried to with drones. But as you said it’s more likely medium range stuff (warehouse->automated truck bays closer to customer or something). I’m sure they explored the idea, economics probably don’t make sense in most cases, anything to dude with municipal land dev alone would be a deterrent. Although there’s been plenty of obvious ideas that just took a bold person to try it and figure out the details.
It's true that Amazon built their empire on the strategy of considering fulfillment speed their primary distinction metric, but they are long past the point where cost could be ignored. Where I live (Germany), most web shops are at least on par with Amazon in terms of fulfillment, and that's before considering "Amazon, but without Prime subscription".
> There is huge demand for hourly package delivery
The market is huge, because what little demands there is, it's very inelastic. You either need super low latency delivery and are willing to pay almost any price (pizza gets cold, deliverator to the rescue!), or you don't. If someone could magically offer the service at lower cost they could own that market, but that market would hardly grow.
Hmm here in Southern Ontario Canada Amazon has 2 delivery blocks a day so I’ve gotten deliveries at either the morning or afternoon depending on when I’m ordering (I know both sets of drivers now as they work different shifts) and I’ve yet to find a retailer or system that’s as fast as Amazon. Canadapost is the only alternative and it’s never as reliable delivery wise. Shopify is the closest 2nd at being most consistently & honest in terms of data. If Amazon could go same day that would be a major innovation here and further eat into Walmart/Best Buy type retail, instant gratification being the only reason I use them.
