Ministers meet
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ROAD haulage permit quotas were discussed this week when Transport Minister William Rodgers met his West German counterpart Kurt Gscheidle in London.
By coincidence, it has also been announced that road haulage permits will no longer be required for traffic to, or in tansit through East Germany. This will take effect on July 1.
The talks with the West German minister centred mainly around international rail transport co-operation and means of easing the delays at Customs points which appear to affect rail wagons more severely than lorries.
Both parties hope that British Rail and Deutsche Bundesbahn will secure a greater share of international freight traffic and that more use will be made of combined transport systems.
DB's success with piggyback lorry-on-train services is commented upon, but it is pointed out that this cannot be extended to Britain as BR's loading gauge is too low to permit it. Instead, the two railways suggest that container systems like Freightliner could be extended.