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Wanted: Blow-up doll...

Date: 31 October 2007

Guy Bird is our editor-at-large and political columnist

.For adult fun in High Occupancy Vehicle lane

Upon hearing that the UK is finally building its first permanent High Occupancy Vehicle lane (HOV) my mind couldn't help returning to a story I heard about HOV veterans in the US installing rubber lady friends on their passenger seats in order to ride the restricted roads without having to actually carry real people.

How successful a gambit it proved to be I've no idea, but the image always makes me laugh. Besides, real passengers can sometimes be hard to come by, and when you do find one they could have poor taste in music and unpleasant habits. They will undoubtedly talk back. And unless they live very near your house it can be a pain to pick them up, which is why, on the whole, 'car sharing' has never really taken off in this country.

But dish out a decent incentive, like shaving valuable time off your commute by making certain congested roads available only to drivers carrying one or more passengers and the take-up might improve. Most of us will have experienced the quiet delight of sailing down a bus lane in the midst of rush hour in a taxi or a bus watching the largely single occupant private cars sitting in stationary traffic beside us. It's a good feeling that you'll soon be able to replicate in your own car if you agree to pick up a work colleague or friend - something fleets should be more easily able to organise than private individuals.

It's also a sound eco-friendly manoeuvre that can seriously lower any fleet's carbon footprint at a stroke. Regularly tuck a passenger in your Porsche Cayenne and you're suddenly and theoretically well under 200g of CO2 per person per kilometre travelled and can look most single occupant drivers of lower-emitting cars in their green eyes without embarrassment. Of course, in an ideal world you'd have a lower emitting five-seater car and more passengers, but still, the HOV idea is a good way for all drivers to be greener without necessarily trading in their GL-Class for a G-Wiz.

“Enforcement of the HOVs will likely be carried out by the local police force, so strapping a virtual rubber friend to your repmobile to gain fraudulent HOV status could land you in hot water with more than the Highways Agency.”

Guy Bird

Yes, the pilot scheme opening in spring 2008 to link the southbound M606 near Bradford to the eastbound M62 towards Leeds - as my opinionist-in-crime Roddy Graham has already pointed out in his BusinessCar blog - is pathetically short at just 1.7 miles. And yes, the USA has had them for years, as has more recently parts of Australia and Spain, but it's a start, and likely to be popular with the public as they are relatively easy and cheap to install and have obvious time and thus cost benefits to the end-user. The Highways Agency estimates a 10% reduction in traffic. HGVs will be banned from using them full-stop, as will minibuses and taxis unless they are carrying passengers.

Set to be replicated elsewhere if successful (four-lane motorways apparently suit HOVs best) they could represent good value for motorists compared to the hugely unpopular, complex and expensive road pricing plans that have been quietly dropped from the Government's latest draft transport legislation.

A word to the wise though: Enforcement of the HOVs will likely be carried out by the local police force, so strapping a virtual rubber friend to your repmobile to gain fraudulent HOV status could land you in hot water with more than the Highways Agency. Find a real work colleague with sound musical taste and some conversation instead.

PS Got a feeling this column is really starting to have some cut-through. Just 12 days after my "Ban the Lib Dems" article Ming Campbell decided to call it quits as Liberal Democrat leader. Pity that daft Shadow Transport Secretary Susan Kramer didn't fall on her sword at the same time.



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