This system is yet another example of truck operators having to spend up big on safety equipment to compensate for stupid and inconsiderate road users, in this case cyclists. No-one who has any idea of how a truck works and what the driver can see would ever consider riding along in that tight space between the truck and the kerb, especially anywhere in front of the drive wheels.

As a truckie it is a recurring nightmare when you are on the road. Truck drivers know those around them in cars, on bikes and on foot do not think, and have not been trained to think, about what is going on around them on the highway. Why not? Truckies are in danger of being involved in a serious accident, which is not their fault in any way but can cause injury or even death for the car driver, bike rider or pedestrian. Despite being innocent and safety conscious, the truckie will have to live the rest of their life with the feelings of guilt they are bound to feel after involvement in a crash.

By using some statistics about road accidents and emphasising a high proportion of trucks being involved in the figures, VicRoads are implying trucks cause major accidents and are killing lots of members of the general public. Yes, trucks appear in the figures at a high rate, they do a lot more kilometres than cars! It has been shown the car driver is at fault in the majority of accidents involving trucks, so why not target them?

In this simple video VicRoads could have made positive statements and tried to keep all stakeholders on side, but no, they had to go for the cheap populist shot at the perennial bad guys, killer truckies. Do they not understand they are shooting themselves in the foot? If they want to create truck corridors for freight movements in Melbourne they need to convince the car driving public, trucks are driven by responsible adults not deadly vermin. Come on Victoria, get with the program!

Safety systems have a great deal of functionality and, if properly used, will definitely deliver a better safety outcome. What we don’t know is how this kind of equipment plays out in the real world with drivers in real life dangerous situations. This is where this project by Volvo is such a good idea. They have wired a number of trucks with a sophisticated array of monitoring gear to assess exactly what happens in the lead up to an accident, as shown in this video.

Unfortunately, the exercise will probably demonstrate the relative ineffectiveness of very expensive systems if the driver does not do the right thing. Good drivers will avoid accidents with or without thousands of dollars worth of electronic back-up. The other of side of the coin is the dangerous driver, and there plenty of them out there. No amount of safety control systems will stop a reckless driver who has little understanding of their vehicle and bad judgement of traffic conditions around them. They will still be able to maim or kill themselves or those on the highway in their vicinity.

I will be surprised if Volvo publish any results unless the research categorically proves truck buyers need to spend countless dollars extra on electronic safety equipment. The best outcome would probably be if the results show truck makers how to improve the interface between the monitoring equipment and the driver to better help the good drivers do their job well and may save the lives of some of the worse drivers.

The album will also includes a poem written by John ‘The Ferret’ Moran which he performed himself. Country music legend, Kelly Dixon also performs his own work. All of the artists have donated their songs and their time to make this album.

The Lights on the Hill is a memorial to truck and bus drivers who have died while doing their job. The Memorial itself, is in Apex Park in Gatton, just off the Warrego Highway, halfway between Brisbane and Toowoomba. An annual convoy sets off from Toowoomba and Brisbane, meeting at the Memorial.

Details about the album and the wall are available from Kathy White, founder and coordinator of the organization on (07) 54 65 6044 or Merchandise Manager Gary Simpson on 0418 15578 or admin@lightsonthehill.com. Shop 23 Warrego Highway Plainlands opposite Rusty’s service station

Here’s a video being put out by the Victoria government trying to cut down on the incidence of rollovers on the highway. This appears to have been stimulated by the laudable work done by the Victorian Road Freight Advisory Council who have set up a number of initiatives to improve truck safety.

VicRoads are going around talking to the industry about the dangers around rollovers and how to prevent them. Will anyone in the industry listen? Of course they will, but the people the campaign really needs to get the message to is the group of drivers who don’t go to information seminars. There are drivers out on the road every day oblivious to the dangers and oblivious to any efforts to help them.

On the road side when they have been pulled over the truck driver thinks the buck stops with them. There is no sense of the responsability being passed up the chain. They feel like victims with the real culprits getting off Scot free.

The RTA rep lists the number of consignors and consignees prosecuted but that information is neither believed or understood by those at the coal face in trucking. Is this a communication issue or are the big boys getting away with it?

For the duration of Truckweek, Australia’s truck drivers have been asked to ’slow down and be courteous to other road users as part of Truckweek 2010′. They have been asked by ATA Chairman Trevor Martyn to make an extra effort for the sake of the industry’s image with the general public. This is always the request but the general public never seem to notice.

“As professionals, I’m asking our nation’s truck drivers to set the standard on the road. But I’m also urging every motorist to remember that truck drivers want to get home to their families too, but our trucks perform very differently to cars,” says Trevor’s statement, released this week.

For most truckie’s this basically means having to suppress their outrage at the way the general motorist treats them, even more than they usually do. Truckies are, in the main, professionals and do the right thing all the time, but we all have our limits.

You can see it happen all the time out on the highway, a truck will be baulked over and over again by a car driver who is totally unaware of the grief they are creating in their wake. They slow at the wrong time then speed up when they should keep a steady speed, all the time failing to look into the rear view mirror.

Eventually, the truckie will work out a way to get past this idiot or just give up and stop for a break. However, sometimes schedules and pressure from others means the truckie must persist and this is where the problems come, like aggressive driving or risky manoeuvres. This is what Trevor is asking, ‘just hang on a little longer before you lose it altogether’.

What we see is a North American prime mover pulling a relatively new trailer. Apparently, the trailer was fully loaded with insulation batts and would therefore be running pretty light. This is the kind of situation where the ridiculous incompatibility possible, when truck and trailer are compliant with the relevant ADRs, can be shown to be dangerous and, in the view of many people, unacceptable.

This doesn’t mean that truck and trailer should have full EBS or ABS throughout. But, instead of a dumb prime mover pulling a dumb trailer, if the braking system and on the trailer had some form of load sensing the trailer wheels would not have locked up and be heading for the rear of Abbot’s white government car at 60 km/h.

Here was an opportunity on prime-time national news for someone in the trucking community to get on a soapbox and use a great opportunity to promote an idea which has been espoused by many in the industry. It was the perfect opportunity, nobody was killed but everyone saw it. This sort of near death experiences happen every day on the roads of Australia because our truck braking rules are about 20 years out of date. Who is going to stand up and shout it from the rooftops?

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