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A news digest of road transport reports from all sectors
Page 116
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• Securicor Parcels is linking with one of France's largest parcels operators as part of a £30m development of the firm's UK and European business.
• Iveco Ford has reaffirmed its commitment to air cooling with the launch of three Deutz-powered eight-leggers.
• The Freight Transport Association has warned international operators to check that their insurance covers losses at sea. Ferries responsibility is often limited to £500.
• Caterpillar has won a $4m US government contract to develop a commercially viable coal-fuelled diesel engine for railway locomotives.
• Combustion engines powering commercial vehicles and cars may be superseded by the fuel cell, likely to be introduced after the year 2000, a scientific conference was told at Hull University (Daily Telegraph, April 5). "The fuel cell is like a battery except that it converts a fuel directly rather than storing it as chemical energy," explained Dr Gary Acres of the London precious-metal-firm Johnson Matthey.
• Sergei Baltacha, Ipswich Town's Russain soccer star, thought a parking ticket on his car was a message of goodwill from a fan until a neighbour explained.
• Police have postponed a scheme to tow away illegally parked vehicles in Bristol after discovering they had nowhere to park them.
• Midland girls are following the example of Neighbours star Kyhe Minogue — by queuing up for the chance to become motor mechanics, reports the Birmingham Evening Mail; Lloyds British Training Services has six girls on its YTS Motor Mechanics Course at Cannock.
• Foden, advocate of the 6 x 4 configuration, has developed a 6 x 2 over two years. • Talk in Moscow have paved the way for liberalisation of road transport between UK and USSR.
• TIP Europe chairman Jim Cleary says TIP made £450, up from £387, on each trailer in the six months till 31 January; company pretax profits were up 35% to £5.1m.
• Transport Secretary Paul Chaimon was reported to have got "all-party support" in the House of Commons to keep 40-tormers off Britain's roads.
• Railfreight Distribution is looking at nine sites in the West Midlands for a Channel tunnel rail depot.
• South Yorkshire Transport is recruiting 80 drivers for their pleasant personalities in order to revamp Route 52 as the UK's first "user-friendly" bus service.
• International Leisure Group chairman Harry Goodman, launching Coach Europe, promised to bring the standards of his airline Air Europe to coach travel on package holidays. Drivers will be "captains" and attendants will serve drinks.
• Apex Load Control of Croydon — 01-684 0959 — has produced a vehicle load constraint guide to complement publications by the Department of Transport and the Association of Webbing Load Restraint Equipment Manufacturers.
• The Friends of the Earth is monitoring diesel truck emissions in 60 UK towns.
• Conamercial vehicle registrations rose to 36,186 in March — the highest level for the month since 1973.
• Britain's non-motorway roads network has deteriorated since 1977, according to the 1988 National Road Maintenance Survey, sponsored by the Department of Transport. Minister Peter Bottomley blames local authorities for failing to spend their allocations and says budgets have been increased by 6% this year.