Higher Productivity Vehicle Taskforce - HPV Taskforce
The Victorian Freight and Logistics Council needed a community website to promote the use of Higher Productivity Vehicles. The site makes use of Forums, Blogs, Document sharing and News feed.
A Higher Productivity Vehicle (HPV) refers to any vehicle combination that allows an operator or company to derive the highest available social, environmental and economic benefit in the execution of a freight task through the equipment used.This equipment could range from rigid vehicles to prime movers with a combination of trailing equipment.
The Higher Productivity Vehicles Taskforce was established by the Victorian Freight and Logistics Council to provide information about these vehicles.
The Federal Government has highlighted the need to increase the capacity of the Australian economy and the need to improve the effectiveness of infrastructure.
Improving the productivity of our existing freight transport is one means to gain capacity and manage congestion, given the anticipated growth of the freight task.
Australian Transport Ministers have agreed that vehicles complying with the National PBS requirements should be considered for deployment.
There are concerns expressed by government agencies in relation to infrastructure supply to support network access and community perception of what can be longer vehicle configurations.
Having information on hand regarding these vehicles and their benefits will assist in portraying a more accurate picture of what industry is seeking, and dispelling misinformation surrounding these vehicles.
The Aim of the HPV Taskforce Website
To provide documented concise information on the next tranche of higher productivity equipment for the road transport industry, as applied to the freight tasks over the next 5-10 years in Victoria.
The information will cover freight tasks in Victoria, including bulk, break bulk and containerised cargoes and regional freight movement.
It will include:
- Safety
- Vehicle emissions
- Fuel consumption
- Productivity gains – loadings, fleet size, applied resources
- Network requirements – specific routing, infrastructure issues, using technology to monitor impacts/performance
- Size – the “big truck” syndrome
- Operators – skills, training, OH&S
- Equipment types – what vehicles are we talking about?
- Specific freight tasks – not a one size fits all approach
- Can the productivity gains justify infrastructure spend to access routes
- Local roads and local government information