IRTE Annual Conference: report by Paul Brockington
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THE proposed new axle spacing regulations for UK commercial vehicles will be sanctioned within the next few weeks, a DoE official told the annual conference of the Institute of Road Transport Engineers at Solihull on Saturday. Mr W. L. Baxter, superintendent engineer (mechanical), vehicle engineering division, was speaking in the technical session on the second day of the conference. And he told a questioner it was unlikely that the double-bottom type of outfit would be approved for British use for many years because of the "roundabout" problem.
This year's conference dealt mainly with environmental, technical and safety problems, with special reference to the Common Market. At the close of the event the Institute's president, Lord Chesham, said that so far as commercial vehicles were concerned, road safety and control of the environmental conditions could only be improved by sound legislation that was reasonably enforced. Public pressure for "banning" commercial vehicles was not welcomed by designers and transport engineers but they did welcome practical suggestions for reductions in noise, smoke and for better hill-climbing ability. Added Lord Chesham: "Transport engineers are conscious of the damage to our environment, and the 7000 members of this Institute are pledged to help develop legislation to meet this".
Earlier, delegates had heard seven speakers on technical aspects of road safety and three papers on vehicle and engine developments — one of them containing harsh criticism of British vehicles by the managing director of Bakers Transport (Southampton) Ltd.