Thread: Its about time they took action on the cowboy trucking companies.

Originally Posted by alien d2

The road network is my work place, I can't go near a job site with out the above

Heard this one before, disagree. Your truck is your office/workplace. Roads are public infrastructure and just like other pieces of public infrastructure there will be a broad cross section of people (including morons who don't understand heavy vehicle braking distances etc) using it. This is a problem across many industries...

Originally Posted by isuzurover

I challenge you to find a study saying road freight is lower cost and more (energy) efficient than rail.

e.g. - this is the first one I found:
http://www.pc.gov.au/__data/assets/p...ttachmentb.pdf

Hi Ben

I'll only make two comments.

1. Look who commissioned the study, a rail freight company.

2. It is justifying the one corridor Brisbane-Sydney-Melbourne I suggested would make economic sense.

Diana

We expect overnight transport because people will do it for us. If everyone said no we would plan for 2 days. We all survived before Sunday shopping. We just had to make sure we bought enough milk on Saturday. Just because we can do something it does mean we have to.

Originally Posted by Lotz-A-Landies

But like passenger services trains are only efficient when taking a large quantity of a single comodity from a single departure location to a single destination. Commodities like coal, grains and other minerals.

Every other form of heavy freight rail lacks rail infrastructure and logistic centres which would not be cost effective to build and maintain for the vast majority of freight. Then rail still requires trucks to deliver the product from the rail head to the customer. The only situations where freight rail would be ecconomic, is the mass transport of containers to and from ports to freight interchanges outside the metropolitan areas and for high speed freight rail between the Brisbane, Sydney, Melbourne and possibly Adelaide and/or Rockhampton.

the only bit you got right is the fact that successive governments have been hoodwinked into letting rail infrastructure decline to the point where it lost critical mass.

i believe the latest cotton crop has the farmers up in arms over the lack of transport capacity that trucks can provide and that they reckon they would be much better served by rail and want it back...

sure you need trucks for local delivery and short point to point work but rail for all the heavy interstate work is a much better way to go most studies have found i believe... not to mention it qould make the up keep of the roads much much cheaper ...

Originally Posted by digger

In my experience it is usually a small number of truck drivers, who drive or behave like "cowboys".

Both the vehicles and the drivers of most heavy vehicles are OK and often the worst we'll find in s slight infringement of time or slipping in swear words on the UHF main channels (repeater/18 or 40 are what I consider main channels)

Usually a verbal request over radio fixes the language. (Often I believe they dont realise they are swearing).

...

Hi Digger

When you send a language warning and particularly when you stop one of these vehicles, do you check to see if they have hands-free UHF sets or a radio operator on board?

Diana

Diana
I think you are arguing a losing battle. Common sense says that a freight train hauling hundreds and hundreds of tonnage behind one or two engines is vastly more efficient. The other benefits are reduced traffic on the roads particularly at rush hour and seperation in the event of a crash or spillage of toxic material. Movement of freight by rail makes sense and is vastly cheaper than the strangle hold currently in place by trucking companies. Simply move the freight within cities from the rail head during the evening and it removes every truck off the highway during the day. Imagine life on the main roads without truck after truck slowing every one down and flattening the odd motorist. Thats without even mentioning the dopped up interstate drivers running dog collars or little black boxes thundering down the back roads at 140+ in a B-double.

Originally Posted by alien d2

Intersting comments
Now here's a thought....
Why don't all cars have to have yellow flashing lights on their roof?
And why isn't every one in the car wearing a safty vest/shirt?
The road network is my work place, I can't go near a job site with out the above

I've had similar thoughts along those lines...
As a professional driver in a Company Badged Vehicle out there for all to see I've had ONE formal complaint made about my driving in 20 years.
Now, as I regard the roads as my Workplace, should I report dangerous drivers who endanger me to Worksafe?

I spend a fair amount of time on the Hume and I would have to say that it is a very different place to what it was 15 years ago when I had a bit to do with the trucking industry.
Drivers for the most part are more professional and there is much less scope to have the overdriven rigs that used to be capable of 145KM/H and more on the flat. Elapsed time cameras and smarter enforcement methods have changed a lot of that.
Back then there were companies that were renowned for being a place for a young bloke to start out, the only problem was that you could only work for them for a short time before you burned out as the conditions would kill you if you didnt put the truck into a tree from a lack of sleep / drugs.
I think that the same thing probably applies today to a number of companies, given that human nature dosent change much. I dont know whether the company currently being investigated follows these practices but it is pretty unusual for an entire fleet to be targeted by the police / RTA.

Regards,
Tote