TruckStopUK.co.uk

by political editor Paul Francis

Plans for a huge lorry park off the M20 to cope when Operation Stack is implemented are likely to take a major step forward within a year, according to Kent County Council.

The politician in charge says a formal planning application is expected to be submitted for the 70-acre park capable of holding more than 2,000 lorries - provided a full assessment of the environmental impact clears the way.

Cllr Bryan Sweetland (Con), KCC’s cabinet member for highways, said he was expecting to press ahead with a detailed planning application once the environmental study was completed.

"We are going to complete the work and off the back of that, we will be putting in a full planning application. As far as we are concerned, it is still the only viable option we have and is the only practical solution on the table. The environmental assessment will probably take a year to complete and we will look at the results."

The news is likely to draw a mixed reaction. Local campaigners who are opposed to the park plan for a site near Aldington will be dismayed that KCC has not been persuaded to abandon the idea.

However, others will welcome the news that there may finally be some progress in a much-delayed project first unveiled three years ago.

KCC has been examining what it describes as a "no frills" option for the park, which would not involve the need for a new junction off the M20 motorway. A solution to that has apparently now been found.

However, the issue of who would pay for the lorry park - estimated at between £25m and £30m - remain unresolved.

KCC hopes government plans to charge foreign hauliers to use the UK’s roads could provide a way forward.

KCC leader Paul Carter said the option of using money raised by foreign hauliers should be considered.

"We have the inconvenience of being the transport corridor. We will be lobbying very hard with the Department of Transport and Mike Penning to make sure Operation Stack Park, improvements to the M2 and M20 are made over the medium term," he said.

Source: Kent Online

Auto Services Perth Director Steve Crozier freely admits that he took a chance when investing in his new Roger Dyson Landoll travelling axle trailer. “It was our first venture into the heavy recovery business and we weren’t completely sure we would have enough work to keep it occupied,” he recalls.

“Roger Dyson understood our hesitancy and offered an excellent deal, with a guaranteed buy-back if things didn’t work out. There’s no chance of that, though – it’s only been on the road a couple of months but we couldn’t possibly manage without the Landoll now!”

Auto Services Perth is an approved Iveco truck servicing agent, and required to provide 24-hour emergency cover for the manufacturer’s customers under its Assitance Non-Stop scheme.

“We’d previously relied on other operators to provide heavy recovery services,” recalls Mr Crozier. “But because we wanted to guarantee the exacting level of service required, we took the important decision to bring this aspect of our business in-house.”

The Landoll 410.48 has a fully hydraulic, 48ft platform (Landolls are also available at 41ft) and offers an ultra low loading angle of less than six degrees. Other features include optional side-mounted outriggers and a 20,000lb remote-controlled winch which is recessed into the floor and does not, therefore, restrict the load space.

Fitted with three Haldex EBS electronically braked 11,000kg axles SAF low-loader axles, it is designed to a gross vehicle weight of 53,000kg. This gives a maximum carrying capacity of 44,000kg, sufficient to recover a six-wheeled tractor unit with fully laden tri-axle trailer.

Mr Crozier says: “The Landoll is easy and safe to use for a single operator, and superbly engineered. It works full-time with a 44-tonne 440hp Iveco Stralis, which we sourced as a used vehicle though the Iveco network, and has been kept extremely busy ever since we took delivery.”

He continues: “We run seven other recovery trucks but this is our first piece of Dyson equipment. Having met Roger at last year’s Tow Show, and seen the quality of vehicles he had on display, it definitely won’t be our last though. In fact, we’re already talking to Roger with a view to ordering a Hydraloader SLa (Super Low approach) slidebed and an accident unit with a PM crane and second vehicle lift, both of which will be mounted on 12-tonne Iveco Eurocargo chassis.”

As well as working for Iveco and for organisations such as RAC Commercial, Auto Services has seen a new and unexpected avenue of business open up since introducing its Landoll.

“We received a call from the AA saying they had a stranded stretched limousine which needed recovering from a roadside in Dundee, but they weren’t sure how to lift it. I told them we had the perfect piece of kit for the job!” says Mr Crozier. “Since then we’ve been in touch with every stretched limousine operator across Central Scotland, so if they break down they know exactly who to call.”

Source: HGVUK

GREAT-grandfather Edward Randell is fed up with lorries getting stuck outside his house due to drivers blindly following sat navs.

The 88-year-old former railway worker said truckers trying to get to the Techno Trading Estate, accessed off Kembrey Street, are directed down the dead-end section of Bramble Road.

He said he gives directions at least once a day to confused drivers – and his front garden wall has been demolished four times in three years by people trying to turn in the road.

“I’m a bit annoyed about it because I’ve got the cost of putting the wall up or the inconvenience of getting in touch with people to come and do it,” he said.

“On top of that, I’m out there every five minutes telling a driver where he has got to go because his sat nav has brought him here. I’ve had enough of it.”

Mr Randell, who has lived in the road for nearly 60 years, said the problem started in 2008 when Swindon Council installed a barrier near his house to stop lorries using the residential route as a cut-through to the trading estate.

He said there are drivers from across the UK and many from the Continent, who cannot speak English very well, so he sometimes has to sketch a map.

Mr Randell said the longer HGVs have to reverse back into Elgin Drive, but the smaller lorries try to turn in Bramble Road, sometimes causing damage to his wall. His wall was last knocked down about three months ago.

He said he has contacted the council’s highways department several times and one officer said she would look into the possibility of new signs.

He said: “I suppose the solution would be getting the sat navs altered to show there’s a barrier, or completely new signage to tell them the Techno Trading Estate is only available off Kembrey Street.”

A Swindon Council spokesman said there is already appropriate signage warning drivers about the situation and the council cannot do anything if sat navs are not up to date.

He said: “If you are going down Elgin Drive, there’s a sign that tells you entry to Bramble Road is prohibited 150 yards ahead. There’s a sign telling you well in advance you cannot go down Bramble Road.

“And as you get closer to the scene, there’s another sign that says there’s no through road and it’s only suitable for cars and bikes.

“There’s signage on the approach to this area that clearly indicates the drivers cannot go down there, but there’s not much we can do if drivers are prepared to pay more attention to their sat nav than to the road signs.

Source: This is Wiltshire

The first longer semi-trailer to take part in the Department for Transport’s (DfT) ten year trial hit the roads today, with Stobart Group carrying groceries for Tesco on a 15.65m SDC trailer.

Stobart’s first run of the trailer – 2.05m more than the usual trailer length of 13.6m – carried 54 cages of goods for the supermarket, a 20% increase in its normal capacity.

Chief operating officer William Stobart says: “Today is another milestone in the company’s history as we operate the first longer trailer in the UK.

“We have worked in partnership with the DfT to help introduce these new trailers and the industry as a whole is set to benefit from the opportunities and environmental advantages they bring.”

Under the terms of the trial Eddie Stobart is allowed to run 90 longer semi-trailers, including 23 at 15.65m and 67 of the 14.6m length.

On Monday SDC was been granted approval by the Vehicle Certification Agency, an executive agency of the Department for Transport, for all five of its longer semi-trailer models.

Source: Commercial Motor

It’s time we found a way to make our trucks greener. gorbould

Truck transport accounts for roughly 25% of energy used in the global transport sector, making it a substantial contributor (2.6%) to worldwide greenhouse gas emissions.

As concerns about greenhouse gas emissions continue to escalate, the introduction of zero-emission technologies within the freight industry is vitally important.

Here at RMIT University, we’ve developed new technology that, we believe, will push us further toward a sustainable and future-ready freight industry.

An industry under threat

Australia has some of the highest road lengths and freight levels per capita in the world. In fact, road freight transport is a $35 billion dollar industry here. Given the sheer size of the Australian land mass, the distance between major cities, and the lack of a feasible rail alternative, road freight is crucial to trade and commerce.

With the price of diesel fuel rising considerably in the past decade and the possible expansion of the carbon tax to include fuel for trucks, those in charge of the freight industry worry their industry is under threat. Low-carbon alternatives to the current fleet are needed.

A possible solution to the problem, and one that we’ve been working towards, is the development of hydrogen fuel cells to replace traditional diesel engines in trucks.

Hydrogen power

Hydrogen fuel cells work by taking hydrogen gas (H?) and combining it with oxygen (O?) to generate an electrical current (and water and some heat as byproducts).

The hydrogen gas is produced through a process called electrolysis (or breaking down) of water using electricity from renewable sources such as wind and solar.

A zero-emission solution of this kind (in both hydrogen production and consumption) could play a key role in addressing the environmental, economic and social factors that will influence the sustainability of the truck industry in the future.

Zero-emission alternatives

Electric battery technology is another zero-emission option that could potentially be used in the transport sector (if charged using electricity from renewable sources). But this technology might not currently be suitable for the truck industry due its low energy storage capacity. For example, existing battery technology doesn’t allow trucks to cover the distance from Melbourne to Sydney on one charge.

Biofuels, including ethanol, various bio-oils and biodiesel, provide another alternative transport fuel. “Second-generation” biofuels are likely to play some role for transport in future, but the amount of crops and land available for biofuel production will be severely limited.

Enough crops and land need to be set aside to supply food for a growing world population, and there are also constraints on available land, water and fertilisers needed to grow “second-generation” fuel crops.

But we focused on hydrogen …

Here in the School of the Aerospace, Mechanical, and Manufacturing Engineering at RMIT, we’ve recently developed Australia’s first model of a fuel cell truck running on hydrogen stored in metal hydride bottles on board the truck. The truck model is an exact replica (1/14th scale) of the Scania Highline series, operated using a remote control unit which simulates the performance of a typical long-haul truck used in Australia (from Melbourne to Sydney, for example).

A range of measurement instruments have been designed for and installed in the model, all of which are connected to a wireless data acquisition system. This system remotely monitors the truck’s performance and collects critical data such as the rate of hydrogen consumption and the electrical power supply in real-time.

By measuring the performance of the model under pre-defined dynamic loads and scaling up the results using purposely-developed mathematical models, the performance of a full-scale hydrogen fuel cell truck can be simulated and predicted.

What now?

In the early days of our research and development, we’ve highlighted some of the technical, economic and social challenges facing the commercialisation of this technology.

A key technical challenge is the development of cost-effective hydrogen storage systems that can carry enough hydrogen on board and provide desirable driving range (again, Melbourne to Sydney is a good example). Various materials/technologies for onboard hydrogen storage are currently being researched and developed to overcome this barrier.

Such technologies include high pressure hydrogen (at 350 and 700 bar, liquid hydrogen and chemical hydrides.

Hydrogen production and distribution are other areas to be considered for further technological development. Hydrogen fuel cells and the required renewable energy technologies for zero-emission production of hydrogen are currently too expensive for commercial development.

That said, the price of hydrogen cells is dropping – they cost roughly $2,000/kilowatt at the moment and that will probably drop to less than $100/kilowatt within 15 years.

Given this current downward trend in prices and the likelihood of such cells being mass produced within a decade, such technologies might not be restrictively expensive in future.

Perception power

Of course, there are also social barriers to be overcome. In particular, there is a public perception that hydrogen is unsafe and unreliable as an energy carrier. The demise of the Hindenburg in 1937 is largely to blame for this perception.

In reality, hydrogen has been proven safer than liquid fossil fuels such as diesel and petrol, if handled properly and if appropriate safety measures are taken.

So while there are still significant challenges to overcome before we see hydrogen-powered trucks on Australian roads, we’re certainly moving in the right direction.

Source: The conversation