Talking Freight Transcript: Higher Productivity Trucks

The argument that I think would be worth making is that we should try to have a cost benefit methodology. This methodology defines the societal value of the trucks. This particular graph would be helpful at trying to rationalize some of the value so that we can look at what the true benefits are to these vehicles. The true benefits extend not just from the shipper, transporter relationship, but they extend right to society at large.

Conclusions are that we should be thinking about creating a friendly truck category where the truck is efficient, proven to be safe, environmentally friendly, and it has some favorable impact on fuel. Performance metrics cannot only include safety; they can include other things as well. They should be fitted with advanced technologies. We need a way of tracking the performance of the vehicles because it is very important to keep on top of this. This has to do with the management of the transport system over time. We want to see a success in the safety side. We want to see a success in the productivity side. We can tweak and fine tune the transportation tasks to make the benefits and potential. We could have a very aggressive expectation of ten times the crash rates for this vehicle class compared to semitrailers. That would be obviously very aggressive, but something, some expected reduction in crash rates associated with these vehicles greater than this current happening today would be important. So more information can be found on this whole subject of vehicles that are integrated more closely with the overall aspect of transportation and transportation economics, there's been a study that is currently being wrapped up by the OECD in Paris.