Newsletter

Dear IFRTT Forum subscriber, During the first week of November I spent a most enjoyable week in Berlin (what a majestic and interesting city!) attending the 5th meeting of the ISO/PC 241 committee, which had the task of reviewing the comments on Committee Draft 2 of ISO 39001, Road Traffic Safety Management Systems.  This is a new ISO standard (due to be published by early 2013) that will be relevant to all organisations that have an impact on road safety.  This includes road authorities (planners, designers and operators), vehicle manufacturers, consignors (shippers), consignees (receivers of freight), freight and passenger transport operators and emergency response organisations.  As in the case of ISO 9001 and ISO 14001, the standard is generic, and organisations will be responsible for identifying and monitoring their own intermediate safety outcome factors in addition to the final safety outcome factors (deaths and serious injuries).  The Editorial Committee is... Read More

Dear IFRTT Forum subscriber, an European update. The weather is in its pre-hibernating and somewhat unruly stage and the birches are saying “see you next year” by glowing like unpolished gold. On the other hand, the economy has a springtime smell, at least in Northern Europe. A small and export-dependant country like Sweden (it is sometimes better to be in a small boat even on the high seas) survived the crisis surprisingly well and truck and bus manufacturers are re-hiring and increasing R&D efforts. There are indications that Germany might start trials on longer, if not heavier, vehicle combinations. This is good news, but I will believe when I see it. The EU Transport Commissioner is still saying no to cross-border operation of modular concept vehicles. He does this on grounds of his (secret) legal interpretation of the W&D Directive. In the long run the “consenting adults” principle cannot be stopped.... Read More

Dear IFRTT Forum subscriber, the snow is fairly deep in the middle and northern parts of Sweden, this brightens up your day and you are able to listen to the different temperature and humidity dependant sounds from stepping on it, my favourite being the “potato-flour” squeal when compressed. Slowly, we get accustomed to telling ourselves that anything above minus 10 degrees centigrade is reasonably mild enough to get started in the morning to get to work and preferable to the plus 40 degrees reported from Melbourne. This seems fairly analogous to the European transport policy debate, squeals have been heard in the past. The European Commission is later this year due to present the next White Paper on Transport Policy for the 2011 to 2020 period. Policy statements like this sometimes tend to crash with realities, but that is probably partly the intent. Unemployment rate is still increasing as well... Read More