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

Hi Mick

I may well be in the minority, often am, but it is not as simple as you suspect. Even if there was no such thing as freight (discussing in the abstract here), road infrastrusture will always be required for people to move locally into town, medium distances between regions and long distances between cities, so the cost of building and maintaining road infrustructure can be spread across a larger population of users or in fact across the whole population.

Rail freight requires similar infrastructure but users are restricted people who own trains, so the cost has to be borne by a smaller population of users with difficulty in justifying the costs to the whole population, particularly when the rail infrastructure is in regional and remote areas not linking major population areas.

No lets look at the costs of the actual vehicles, a tractor and trailer/s has to be structurally able to carry itself, the payload and the trailers following, essentially meaning every item has a little cost of the weight of the total tractor trailer combination. The rail locomotive are exceptionally powerfull and able to tow huge payloads and rolling stock. The rolling stock however have to be significantly stronger (esentially over engineered) because not only do they have be strong enough to carry their individual load but strong enough to tow sometimes dozens of rolling stock behind them so just like the tractor trailer, freight on rail has its costs for the load and a little extra added on for the costs of hauling over engineered rolling stock , therefore detracting from the efficiencies of size of the railway locomotive.

Rail marshalling yards, unlike roadfreight yards which just need large expanses of ground, gravel or concrete with minimal maintenance, rail freight requires marshalling yards for all the freight arriving and departing, plus the rolling stock not in use, signalling equipment, people to maintain track and signalling equipment and staff to monitor the operation of rail traffic signalling infrastructure.

The load logistical infrastructure in road and rail freight while dependant on the nature of the load may be similar at the depot. But rail freight still needs road transport infrastructure and trucks to pick up or deliver the freight to the customer. These road costs need to be transferred from road to rail for the final calculation of rail freight efficiencies.

So back to my original statement (above) rail freight is very efficient for bulk loads and high capacity freight corridors, but can not match road for vendor to customer speed or outside high volume corridors like Melbourne to Brisbane.

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Originally Posted by Beckford

Driven on the F3 after dark lately? The trucks own it.

The other night when on the way home from a Range Rover Club meeting, a truck attempted to overtake us in the right hand lane at the start of the F3. He was not speed limited in any way. (We were getting a lift in a classic V8 Rangie, so we were flying along.)

The best solution is to build a second freight rail line and get the trucks off the road.

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What a load of ****, the roads were built to move commerce between cities, not for bumbling motorists to wander along at what ever speed suits them. Build a second frieght rail line, what a joke, why? so as we can have twice as much frieght stranded in containers all over the country.
If all the trucks stopped right now the country would starve, run out of fuel and go bust in a week. get the trucks off the road, what a joke, you have no idea, Regards Frank.

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Originally Posted by alien d2

Why don't all cars have to have yellow flashing lights on their roof?

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I have a flashing yellow light. When I had it on my car the people in the white cars with flashing red and blue lights were very jealous. They kept on stopping me and wanted me to take it off.

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Originally Posted by alien d2

And why isn't every one in the car wearing a safty vest/shirt?

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Your basic VR Commodore driver wears one.

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Originally Posted by incisor

RAILROADS

:angel:

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You are joking of course the Australian rail system is a JOKE, always has been and always will, I can recall one (out of hundreds) incident where an abbotoir was sent broke by NSW Rail parking 20 odd container cars of frozen meat at a rail yard out near Chullora, where there was no power supply, they were supposed to be delivered to powered sites at Glebe Island.
I used to cart Chilled meat from Bourke abbatoirs to CTAL at Botany bay, with guaranteed delivery same day, NSW Rail near sent this abbatior broke, but they seen the light and employed trucks to deliver and not one lost load. The Rail system is unworkable in Australia, even in the coal industry, why isn't coal from the south Coast transported by rail, because it is not viable or reliable, most is transported by road and if it wasn't there would be no coal industry on the South coast, Rail is a Joke, look at how many country abbatoirs have rail spurs, that are never used, it's all transported by road because rail simply can't be relied on, Regards Frank.

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Originally Posted by Lotz-A-Landies

Hi Mick

I may well be in the minority, often am, but it is not as simple as you suspect. Even if there was no such thing as freight (discussing in the abstract here), road infrastrusture will always be required for people to move locally into town, medium distances between regions and long distances between cities, so the cost of building and maintaining road infrustructure can be spread across a larger population of users or in fact across the whole population.

Rail freight requires similar infrastructure but users are restricted people who own trains, so the cost has to be borne by a smaller population of users with difficulty in justifying the costs to the whole population, particularly when the rail infrastructure is in regional and remote areas not linking major population areas.

No lets look at the costs of the actual vehicles, a tractor and trailer/s has to be structurally able to carry itself, the payload and the trailers following, essentially meaning every item has a little cost of the weight of the total tractor trailer combination. The rail locomotive are exceptionally powerfull and able to tow huge payloads and rolling stock. The rolling stock however have to be significantly stronger (esentially over engineered) because not only do they have be strong enough to carry their individual load but strong enough to tow sometimes dozens of rolling behind them so just like the tractor trailer, freight on rail has a little extra added on for the over engineering of the rolling stock and detracting from the efficiencies of size of the railway locomotive.

Rail marshalling yards, unlike roadfreight yards which just need large expanses of ground, gravel or concrete with minimal maintenance, rail freight requires marshalling yards for all the freight arriving and departing, plus the rolling stock not in use, signalling equipment, people to maintain track and signalling equipment and staff to monitor the operation of rail traffic signalling infrastructure.

The load logistical infrastructure in road and rail freight while dependant on the nature of the load may be similar at the depot. But rail freight still needs road transport infrastructure and trucks to pick up or deliver the freight to the customer. These road costs need to be transferred from road to rail for the final calculation of rail freight efficiencies.

So back to my original statement (above) rail freight is very efficient for bulk loads and high capacity freight corridors, but can not match road for vendor to customer speed or outside high volume corridors like Melbourne to Brisbane.

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Oh yeah you are right:)

You are in the minority

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Originally Posted by slug_burner

Oh yeah you are right:)

You are in the minority

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That's O.K. but I'm also not wrong.

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Originally Posted by Lotz-A-Landies

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

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OK, so attacking the author with no substantive criticisms. Is that because you can find no problems with the method/numbers.

And your next post is a lengthy rant with no facts...

Rail is heavily utilised in Germany and Switzerland for freight that would otherwise be taken by road.

The fact is that more utilisation of rail freight makes far more sense in countries like AU with a highly centralised population than it does in decentralised companies like Germany.

In fact - if we take a leaf out of Germany's book and limit trucks to 80km/h (maybe not across the nullarbor and up the west coast), I would bet that would decrease the accident rate (or at least severity!) and move more freight onto rail. (how's that for an equally unsubstantiated claim to balance things out).

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Originally Posted by Mick-Kelly

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.

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You're living in a dream world, think about how many extra trains and rail lines that would be needed to take over the frieght now hauled by truck. This country doesn't have the population or the revenue (derived from that population) to build the infrastructure to do away with road transport between major centres.
The USA with 300million pop. and around the same size as Australia couldn't survive without road transport. Why do you think Governments here and overseas invest in Highways instead of Rail, because road is cheaper, more reliable and can deliver point to point, so next time your lollygagging along a major transport route holding up traffic while your admiring the booger you just picked, think about the bloke behind you in a truck trying to earn a living, Regards Frank.

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Originally Posted by Tank

What a load of ****, the roads were built to move commerce between cities, not for bumbling motorists to wander along at what ever speed suits them. Build a second frieght rail line, what a joke, why? so as we can have twice as much frieght stranded in containers all over the country.
If all the trucks stopped right now the country would starve, run out of fuel and go bust in a week. get the trucks off the road, what a joke, you have no idea, Regards Frank.

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(sorry to pick on your post Frank, i've been doing that a lot lately i am afraid)
Fifty years ago, everything was moved by rail. The joke is now, the joke is the railways can't deliver due to getting run down and selling off the infrastructure till it cannot do its job.
Every station used to have a goods siding, even in suburbia. Towns were built not around roads but around the railways. Roads were built to service the railways. Don't believe it? Check old maps- roads radiate from rail centres. Some towns didn't have road access at all, Tullah in Tas only got a road 40 years after the railway was built, Magnet in Tas never got a road and closed when the mine railway closed. You still can't drive there...
Every conceivable cargo was shipped by rail-livestock, meat, milk, mail, the circus, cement, eggs, grain, fruit, fuel both liquid solid and gas, sugar, army tanks, bricks, steel, manure, pets, water in times of drought, your great grandmother's piano likely arrived by rail unless you lived a few km from the manufacturer. Hell the railways introduced containerised interstate shipping to Australia. Minimum quantity one postcard.
If the trucks stop, the railways could, if given a fighting chance, take up the slack. Not overnight, that is impossible. But trucks aren't Australia's saviour as some seem to think.
Funny enough if the trains stop, most of us wouldn't have electricity and so wouldn't be able to argue the point at all. Not like trucks have a hope in hell of moving the hundreds of thousands of tonnes of coal that the railways can per day.

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Originally Posted by isuzurover

OK, so attacking the author with no substantive criticisms. Is that because you can find no problems with the method/numbers.

And your next post is a lengthy rant with no facts...

Rail is heavily utilised in Germany and Switzerland for freight that would otherwise be taken by road.

The fact is that more utilisation of rail freight makes far more sense in countries like AU with a highly centralised population than it does in decentralised companies like Germany.

In fact - if we take a leaf out of Germany's book and limit trucks to 80km/h (maybe not across the nullarbor and up the west coast), I would bet that would decrease the accident rate (or at least severity!) and move more freight onto rail. (how's that for an equally unsubstantiated claim to balance things out).

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So you reckon that a car travelling at 100klm/h (probably overtaking a truck doing the speed limit of 80klm/h) and running under the front of a truck doing 80klm/h is going to reduce fatalities, yeh! Most heavy vehicle accidents involving cars are the fault of the car driver, so it would be logical to remove all cars from the road.
You're comparing Europe with Australia, you are joking are'nt you, Regards Frank.