Freightliners' 15 vehicle bid adjourned
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• A Freightliners terminal manager denied at Cardiff on Monday that other professional hauliers could achieve better results than those being obtained at the Swansea Freightliners terminal.
The application by Freightliners Ltd. (Western area) for 15 additional artics. was heard by Mr. R. R. Jackson, the S. Wales LA and later adjourned sine die.
Mr. Stanley Judd, terminal manager at Swansea, said the average daily mileage per vehicle over a selected five-week period was 52 and the number of average trips per vehicle day was 2.5.
The LA asked: "Would you agree that if your business were operated by other professional hauliers they would achieve a much better mileage in one day?'
Mr. Judd replied: "In the present state of the development of our business, I do not. It is a sort of collection and delivery work using, because of the loads we are offered, a trunk-type road vehicle. As such it is a fairly new kind of operation and I don't think our
standards can he matched up to trunk ve,hicle standards.
"At the present stage of business I do not think we can be doing much more.
Earlier Mr. Judd had said he was prepared to modify the application slightly to an area of 25 miles and Pembrokeshire instead of 40 miles.
The gross figure for all terminal traffic at Swansea, he said, was in excess of £73,000. The total earnings of the Freightliners road vehicles was f 15,058.
He agreed that during the five weeks under review they had probably lost money on the first and fifth weeks but made a profit during the second, third and fourth weeks. Appearing for 22 objectors, Mr. Rosser John said there was no evidence that the extra vehicles would be employed any differently from the 10 already making a loss. They were bound to be unprofitable in the way they were being operated.
Mr. Judd said that Freightliners terminals throughout the country were operating at similar levels.