he fax of 'ansport life
Page 42
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TOBEFi has been designated tional Teletext Month. Most /readers — like most of the t of the population — will ie reached the second half of month without being aware his fact. And most will feel le the worse for this gap in ir knowledge. Should they? he growth of Information :hnology — IT for short — has .1n so fast as to baffle many )ple, especially those of a leration to whom IT was a :lity attributed to an early lywood star called Clara N. But it is impossible to ore, and even a conservative ustry like road haulage has rted to take it seriously. .eletext is the generic name the system of information lsmitted, in coded form, ween the lines of television :ures. The system provides eral hundred pages of armation which can be )layed on television receivers
:d with a special decoder.
one million such sets are rently in use, and Teletext nth aims to increase that nber by 50 per cent. Both 2 and ITV use the system, ler the respective trade ties of Ceefax and Oracle.
'addition to much general is and entertainment, ;text provides some trmation of direct use to road 'sport. The constantly ated news about the road ditions is probably the most iable feature, but there is ) much financial and other mess information. Teletext (ices are free.
ut road transport's major :rest has been in the systems linked to British Telecom's Prestel network. This uses ordinary telephone lines to provide information from a very large number of bodies, known as Information Providers, or IPs for short.
The number of pages available is almost infinite, and it has two important additional characteristics. The first is that it can be used in both directions, allowing information to be fed back from subscribers to IPs. The second is that access to certain pages can be confined to specialist groups, known as Closed User Groups, or CUGs. Road haulage now has two nationwide Prestel-based systems seeking to attract its attention. The NFC's Datafreight was first on the scene, soon followed by the RHA's Cargofax. Although there are important differences, both systems have similarities.
Perhaps the most important common feature — and certainly the most obvious selling point — is information about available traffic. In these economically depressed days traffic of any sort is scarce. This scarcity is a two-edged weapon. The systems have less traffic to offer than they would have in more prosperous times, which makes potential subscribers cautious about joining. On the other hand, that very scarcity makes hauliers more eager to explore every avenue where precious loads might be found.
But the two systems also provide other information which can be equally valuable. The RHA International Group has started to demonstrate this by reproducing some appropriate Cargofax pages in its Bulletin, so that waverers can see what they would get for their money. French toll rates, German weekend bans, Italian Customs strikes, Cross-Channel ferry delays and much else are all notified immediately — but only to members of the Cargofax system. By the time this information has been circulated in the Bulletin, Cargofax subscribers will have had access to it for several days or even weeks.
This instant access, and the constant updating, are the main benefits of both systems. Moreover, the comprehensive index means that the information can always be found when it is wanted. There is no need to seek elusive pieces of paper. Details are available throughout the 24 hours.
But although IT is already changing the way in which things are done, in road haulage and elsewhere, it has definite limitations. Each "page" consists at most of 23 lines of 40 characters. The amount of information which can be compressed into this format is very limited. A full CM page would occupy at least 10 Prestel pages. Few people enjoy reading text in these short bursts.
Datafreight's news service attempts to get as much as possible into each page by cramming the maximum number of letters into each line, regardless of conventional hyphenation. The resulting pages can look rather like this:
Haulage permit quotas cannot be reconcil -ed with the free trade principles of th -e Treaty of Rome and should be abolishe -d as soon as possible That is the vie -w of the House of Lords committee on th -e European Communities in a report publ -ished last week. The Committee had hea -rd evidence from the Department of Tran -sport, the EEC Commission, the Freight Transport Association and the Road Haula -ge Association.
While this makes sense, it is hardly easy reading.
That is not the only limitation. There are no photographs, and although diagrams can be reproduced, the system's inherent limitations mean that these, though often colourful, are crude. So to say that Teletext and Prestel will never replace the printed word is not to be a twentieth century Luddite, but a realist.
But the interesting question is whether most hauliers are Luddites, resistant to change. Some will already have compared the likely costs and benefits, and turned them down. How many, though, will have rejected the idea without really understanding how it works?
Cargofax has recently been demonstrated on a nationwide tour; attendances were said to be "disappointing".
It is possible to get some idea of what is on offer at many public libraries, where Prestel is often available. Although both Datafreight and Cargofax are CUGs, some pages are available to non-members. Keying page 890 brings Datafreight's news pages, and some information about the system.
Cargofax is more coy, and does not even appear in the index. But persistence (or computer error?) finds page 350888, on which are displayed the various "chapters" under which information is available.
It is good news that some RHA District offices are making Cargofax available on a group basis. Practical use is the best way to prove whether or not the system meets a real need. Any haulier who does not even take the trouble to find out what is on offer may live to regret it.