GREEN REVOLUTION
Page 3
If you've noticed an error in this article please click here to report it so we can fix it.
• Many operators will see our interviews with environmental groups (pages 50-2) as welcome comic relief amid the gloom of a recession. It's hard not to smile at the astonishing ignorance behind solemn proposals for the use of inland waterways (with all those pretty shire horses, forelock-tugging lock-keepers and sensible 4mph speed limits).
Their laughter may become a little strained when self-appointed experts complain that haulage is "underpriced" (in fact it overpays its track costs by hundreds of millions of pounds a year). But fleet engineers will have a good chuckle from the news that fuel savings from aerodynamic advances are "being nullified with the introduction of bigger trucks". And the suggestion that dery prices should be linked to vehicle size is nearly as silly as the claim that one 40-tanner damages the road more than 200,000 cars (yes, really).
But don't laugh too hard, because this mishmash of misinformation is dangerous, because an ill-informed public could all too easily be convinced to support ill-conceived legislation from vote hungry politicians.
Hauliers know that getting a tin of baked beans on to the shelf at Tesco's at a price a pensioner can afford will not be easy if loads are forced on to inefficient means of transport, be they canal boats, pack-mules or post-Beeching railways that have neither the scope nor the efficiency to do much more than they are now. Its time for the road transport industry to start hitting back with the hard facts that are so locking amid the prejudices of the environmentalists.