Freight
of fatal motorway collisions where more than half (52 per cent) involved HGV’s despite the fact that HGV’s only make up 10 per cent of the traffic on motorways in terms of miles driven in 2012. On minor roads HGV’s are five times more likely than cars to be involved in fatal accidents2
. In fact the
cost to society of each road fatality is estimated at £1.8 million. Despite these figures, after intense lobbying from the industry, the government is trialling 7ft longer HGV’s which it admits have bigger tail swings and blind spots as well as inferior manoeuvrability. At a
European level, hauliers are pushing for 82ft double articulated mega trucks which the European Commission admits are more dangerous than existing HGV’s. Rail is less intrusive than road as the width of land surface taken up by a double railway line is only 12 metres compared with 47m for a three lane motorway. Noise from trains is less intrusive than noise from roads – only around 40,000 people are impacted by rail noise, but around 700,000 people are impacted by road noise.
It is estimated that between 2.3 and
Helping Climate Change Act commitments
Rail freight, which produces 70 per cent less carbon dioxide emissions; than the equivalent road journey5
, has a key
role in helping the government meet its Climate Change Act commitments to reducing transport carbon dioxide emissions by 80 per cent by 2050. Energy efficiency is directly related
to carbon dioxide emissions, rail is significantly more energy efficient than other modes, with the exception of shipping. A tonne of goods can travel 246 miles by rail as opposed to 88 miles by road on a gallon of fuel according to Network Rail figures6
, making Rail
transport around four times less carbon intensive than road. Rail becomes more attractive as diesel prices increase as the cost of getting oil out of the ground goes up. Already, diesel fuel costs have gone up 21 per cent in last two years with
December 2013 Page 73
5.3 per cent of maintenance costs to infrastructure, especially bridges and pavements are caused by overloaded HGV’s across the EU, which amount to an estimated cost of 25 billion Euros3
.
In the UK, roadside weight checks had a 58 per cent overloading rate4
last year.
Research, commissioned by Freight on Rail, found that lorries are up to 160,000 times more damaging to road surfaces than the average car; some of the heaviest road repair costs are therefore almost exclusively attributable to the heaviest vehicles
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