Posted by Rita Mu
The trucking industry’s greenhouse emissions have dropped since moving to bigger vehicles in the last decade, but the rail industry has revealed half of Australians despise having large trucks travelling through the city.
A recent Auspoll survey of 1500 respondents, commissioned by seven organisations, including the Australasian Railways Association, showed more than half of Australians want trucks moving only during non-peak times while 50 per cent want large trucks banned from cities.
However, Australian Trucking Association (ATA) Chief Executive Stuart St Clair said replacing big trucks with smaller ones would increase congestion in cities, with more trucks needed to deliver goods.
“A semi-trailer can carry three times more than a smaller, two-axle rigid truck,” St Clair said.
“As a result, it takes 42 semi-trailer trips to deliver a thousand tonnes of goods, such as the items you see on the shelves of every supermarket. They’re delivered by truck, not by rail. It would take 143 trips for two-axle trucks to deliver the same amount of freight.
“There would be more trucks on the road and congestion would be worse.”
Chairman of ATA, David Simon, said banning larger trucks from cities would also worsen greenhouse gas emissions.
According to a report commissioned by the ATA, the trucking industry’s greenhouse gas emissions dropped 35 per cent per billion tonne kilometres since 1990 when the industry began the move to larger truck combinations such as B-doubles.
“It takes 77 three-axle rigid trucks to move a thousand tonnes of freight, but only 26 B-doubles,” Simon
explained. “In moving the freight, these 26 B-doubles would produce 25 per cent less greenhouse gas emissions than the vast fleet of smaller trucks needed to do the job.
“On an industry wide scale, using larger, safer truck combinations reduces the congestion on the roads and reduces greenhouse gas emissions – as the industry has shown over the last twenty years.”
Image: travelpod.com