Competing Interests Illustrate Problems Industry Deals With

Nothing ever comes easy to the haulage industry when dealing with the public or attempting to abide by regulations. The problems our industry deals with are exemplified in a row currently going on in Iver, in south-east Buckinghamshire. As a leading provider of HGV training in Buckinghamshire, we can certainly sympathise with residents and haulage companies at the same time.

The problem in Iver stems from the fact that residents are unhappy about the number of HGVs using village roads in order to get to industrial sites. This is entirely understandable. Most of England’s small towns and villages have roads that are just not meant to handle HGV traffic. However, with nowhere else to drive, operators have no other choice.

The solution for Iver was a bypass road that would take HGVs around the village and near Langley station. So far so good. But then along came plans for High Speed Rail 2 (HS2) and subsequent plans to give residents living around London greater access to the capital by rail. If HS2 plans become reality, it will force a relocation of Langley station and loss of open space intended for the proposed bypass road. The road would have to be scrapped due to insufficient space for it and new rail lines to service a relocated Langley.

What we clearly have here is a situation of competing interests. On the one hand, the village of Iver wants to reduce HGV traffic travelling through the town – an objective the haulage industry fully embraces. On the other hand, supporters of the high-speed rail link want this project to have priority for better service to London and Heathrow. Unfortunately, they both cannot have their way. One is going to have to give.

The World We Live In

These kinds of disagreements are nothing new to companies involved in haulage and transport. This is the world we live in. We are sure planners would do things differently if we could turn back the clock and start over. Nevertheless, the road system we have is all that we have at this point in time. We have to make the best of our system in ways that provide the most benefits for the most people.

To be clear, the haulage industry and their HGVs are not to blame for what is happening in Iver. In many of these cases, the simple solution is just to ban HGVs altogether. Nonetheless, it is just not workable. What we have to do is figure out ways to meet everybody’s objectives with as little inconvenience and damage as possible. Hopefully, a good solution can be found for the people of Iver.

The HGV Training Centre offers HGV training in Buckinghamshire and all across the UK. We train individual drivers hoping to earn a commercial licence as well as company drivers in need of remedial instruction and CPC driver certification renewal. For all your commercial driving needs, the HGV Training Centre is the one to call.