• I am delighted to hear that Trailerent's two Crane
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Fruehauf box van trailers, destined to raise money in the coming year for the Save the Children Fund, have found their first two rental customers, both Nottingham-based companies.
Boots and Homespeed have taken a trailer each for the next three months — Boots to use it on their Birmingham to Nottingham delivery run and Homespeed to use the trailer throughout the UK.
The Trailerent scheme, it is hoped, will raise over V.0,000 in rental revenue to give to the Save the Children Fund for famine relief in Western Sudan. There could be no worthier cause. • If you should be driving in North Wales between now and the end of the year you might be pulled in by the police. God forbid that this would happen to all you endorsement-free-licence holders, but wait. Don't get all defensive and start crying "honest officer, I wasn't speeding. I never drink and drive and yes I indicated before executing my last manoeuvre" . . . Chances are that the boys in blue will have stopped you in order to commend you on your safe and courteous use of the road.
Good drivers will receive special vehicle licence wallets endorsed with a road safety caption.
People always like a pat on the back, as well-behaved dogs enjoy being stroked. I hope that this exercise in North Wales will have the kind of effect on mad drivers that reduces an enraged Doberman Pinscher to a loving, friendly mutt which rolls on its back to be tickled. Sigh.
I. Commercial Motor 's youngest test driver was sent to Germany last week to road test Volkswagen's new LT 28 Turbo Transporter.
While bombing along on the wide country roads around Hanover, the unfortunate driver saw an oncoming car and realised that both vehicles were in the same lane. Having wound down the window he leant out and signalled to the other driver to get on to the other side of the road. This proved fruitless and seconds later both machines had to brake severely to avoid hitting one another. My colleague leapt out of his truck and in no uncertain terms inquired as to the sanity of the other and why he hadn't been driving on the right side of the. .
You guessed it. The German had indeed been in the right — both literally and figuratively. To make matters worse the owner of the other vehicle was none other than Volkswagen's commercial vehicle division chief engineer.
I am not at liberty to divulge my colleague's identity (honour among thieves and all that) although it is available to all commercial vehicle manufacturers for the usual fiver, . .
• A Land-Rover driven by Sally Chipperfield and towing a trailer full of lion cubs and miniature cattle, broke down on the M6 not 609,300km from Walsall.
Whether the animals had anything to do with this breakdown I cannot way. What I can say, however, is that nervous Walsall residents were spotted in the streets later that day wearing bush hats and armed with Daktari stun-guns. • Have a look at this picture. What do you see? A great big refuse collector in front of an aeroplane, right?
Well, I was sent the pic a little while back and accompanying it was the following caption — 'The Biffa team working unobstrusively alongside airport staff around the Gatwick complex'. If that's unobstrusive what's noticeable?
Still, the photo has earned space in this less than-illustrious column . which was, after all, the object of the exercise!