Local and international speakers talk up technology at Intelligent Transport Systems summit
By Steve Skinner | September 20, 2013
Operator benefits from the use of telematics through increased safety, productivity and cost savings were demonstrated at a seminar organised by the Truck Industry Council (TIC)
this week.
Telematics is the capture, transmission and remote storage of truck and trailer data, usually involving GPS and often in real-time. The TIC represents the united views of truck manufacturers and importers.
TIC Chief Technical Officer Simon Humphries says benefits to the bottom line were not only in areas such as fuel use, tyre wear, brake pad wear and preventive maintenance, but in insurance costs as well.
“If you can demonstrate that you’ve got improved safety through the use of telematics, then the insurance companies are starting to listen,” Humphries says.
Huge potential fuel savings from reduced engine idle time were shown by Dean Langenberg, the Australian agent for global telematics service provider Procon.
Langenberg said that his system enabled a new customer to discover that its tipper drivers were idling their trucks for up to 52 minutes after starting them up first thing in the morning. Procon was detecting truck idle times of up to 50 per cent in wharf cartage.
Other benefits of telematics included not only the obvious one of vehicle tracking, but also speed alerts for linehaul operators, and ‘geo’ alerts so that, for example, warehouses could prepare for the arrival of a client’s truck, thereby reducing turnaround times, and concrete could be mixed at just the right time before the arrival of agitators at a batching plant.
The seminar was held as part of the big Intelligent Transport Systems Summit held in Sydney over several days, with attendees from around the world.
Other Truck ITS seminar speakers included Chris Koniditsiotis, Chief Executive Officer of Transport Certification Australia, and Dr Peter Sweatman, an Australian who heads up the University of Michigan Transport Research Institute.
You can read the full feature on the ITS seminar in an upcoming issue of ATN.