SHADES OF PROGRESS

September 12, 2007 Vol. 3, No. 19

You’ll see in the collection of new products below a pair of pretty exciting announcements from two enterprising outfits in the communications game, Shaw Tracking and PeopleNet.

The level of sophistication on this front continues to amaze me, especially as I remember going to a press conference – at Frederick Transport -- back in the mid-1980s in which satellite tracking was first introduced to the unsuspecting masses. Fears of Big Brother were in the air, but that never became an issue.

And now? Well, we’ve come a very long way from that crude tool presented way back when. All manner of data can now be shuffled back and forth in milliseconds, creating efficiencies that nobody could even dream about 20 years ago.

Around the same time, more or less, I visited Glengarry Transport in Montreal, where Ken Weisberg of Carrier Logistics (both still around and thriving, I’m happy to say, unlike Glengarry) was installing what I believe was the first automated – read, computerized – dispatch and routing system in a Canadian fleet. It didn’t help Glengarry quite enough, it seems, but it was the launch of another side of the fascinating digital revolution that propels us still. We take dispatch software for granted nowadays.

But I’m old enough to remember the first little handheld calculator, and before that the first transistor radio, both of which were revolutionary in my life. And I think it takes someone of my vintage to understand how far trucking has come in just two decades and a bit. If I might be spared a moment of cynicism, I’ll suggest that shippers sometimes seem to have been the main beneficiaries of all this. Or let me put it another way and say that these amazing advances in technology have allowed freight haulers to serve their customers better and better. Yes, that’s nicer.

STICKING WITH MY CYNICAL SELF, I’ve gotta write a little bit here about biofuel. Seems I’ve raised the ire of some western folk with an editorial I wrote for the mother ship magazine, Today’s Trucking, in the September issue. It was quite benign, really, but I registered doubt – as I’ve done in this space on several occasions – about the wisdom of a blind leap into a biofuel future without a solid view of its implications for the world’s food supply.

By the way, I have no idea what ‘ire’ is, but I sure do like raising it.

Anyway, one Saskatchewan caller left me a message in which he said he took “great exception” to my editorial. I haven’t been able to hook up with him yet, so I’m not entirely sure what he’s on about. I guess he’s a wheat farmer. Another one, an e-mailer from Alberta, suggested I should be more concerned about “all the acres currently being used to grow tobacco and opium.” He cited Zimbabwe as an example, which seemed to me to be a rather bizarre note. That’s a landlocked African country just north of South Africa, incidentally, formerly Southern Rhodesia. It’s about the size of Montana and only 8.2% of its total area is arable land (Canada sits at just 4.6%, but think of the whole).

In any case, though I enjoyed that little research trip off topic, the point is that my e-mailer’s argument is specious. I can't imagine that the amount of land used to grow tobacco -- and especially opium – in Zimbabwe or anywhere else amounts to more than a tiny pin-prick percentage of the acreage devoted worldwide to corn and rapeseed and what have you.

Flawed logic is what you see there, and I fear that many biofuel proponents haven’t thought things through much better. I am not, absolutely not, criticizing the fuel itself. Not yet. It may indeed represent a partial solution to our energy woes, though probably not our environmental challenges. All I want is some intelligence applied to the biofuel option, not a blind leap into unknown territory that nobody really understands.

And as I write that, I wonder what will happen in Minnesota where Governor Tim Pawlenty wants to mandate biodiesel at a 20% blend rate by 2015, up from its current 2%. He made that proposal, oddly enough, before an audience of farmers. I want good science and good economics here, not pandering to a powerful interest group.

SHELL CANADA GIVES ME REASON TO SMILE after that sourness, thankfully, and I’ve been meaning to say so for a couple of months now. They’ve hooked up with the Heavy Duty Distributor Council of Canada (HDDC) to help address our serious shortage of technicians by launching the ‘Heavy Duty Technician Scholarship.’

Shell and the HDDC will provide six regional scholarships of $1000 each, starting this month. Students are eligible if they’re enrolled in “the second year of a Canadian Association of Motive Power Educators (CAMPE) recognized program relating to the field of heavy-duty equipment, focusing in road and transport.” Recipients will be chosen based on their academic merit, financial need, and desire to contribute to the future of the trucking industry.

“The scholarship is the first of its kind for the Canadian transport industry, and is our way of offsetting the financial challenges of training students pursuing a career in road transport,” said Les Markiewicz, general manager of commercial sales and marketing at Shell.

The application deadline is Oct. 31, 2007, and successful applicants will be awarded their scholarships by Dec. 31 of this year. More information can be found at www.shell.ca/transport.

Thanks, Shell. Wish we could have more of this community spirit, don’t you?

This newsletter is published every two weeks. It's a heads-up notice about what's going on with trucking technology as well as what you can see at www.todaystrucking.com where you'll find in-detail coverage of nearly everything that's new. Plus interesting products that may not have had the 'air play' they deserved within the last few months. Why not subscribe today?

And while you’re there at www.todaystrucking.com, check out the Decision Centers. They’re essentially libraries on specific subjects like Engines or Braking Systems. We’ve gathered all manner of information from maintenance manuals to research reports – and we’re always finding more – to help you make decisions about spec’ing, operating, and maintaining trucks and truck systems.

A new wrinkle at todaystrucking.com that promises to be lively is the Community Forum where you can wax poetic about nearly anything. Have a look. And inside that whole new wing of our award-winning website called The Trucking Life, you’ll soon find other feature material like a classic truck series showcasing the glory of old Macks and Kenworths and Whites and you name it.

If you have comments of whatever sort about Product Watch, or maybe a gizmo I should know about, please contact me at rlockwood@newcom.ca.

FLEET & FREIGHT MANAGEMENT

(September 12, 2007) -- Shaw Mobile is a flexible real-time system that will improve driver productivity

LIGHTWEIGHT ALLIANCE APU

(September 12, 2007) -- Freightliner’s private-label offering is an improved version that packs a punch

AN APU FOR 2008

(September 12, 2007) -- RigMaster is nearly ready for the emissions hurdle next year

REMAN TRANSMISSIONS

(September 12, 2007) -- Eaton adds 10-speeds to Canadian reman lineup

REMAN TRAILER AXLES

(September 12, 2007) -- ArvinMeritor targets intermodal carriers