I would be interested to know your views on who changed transport for the better or worse ?
individual people / Companies in all aspects of National & International Transport.
It could be pioneering routes or a simple invention/modification that made our lives easier or worse
both past and present.
Your opinions I am sure will vary, some may say positive things about a particular person/firm & others
opinions may be negative ?
Regards
Kenny
Hi Sgt Major - just to kick off this thread :
What about T.I.P. trailer rental company, subsidiary of U.S. giant Transport International Pool - who was really the first major specialist trailer rental company in UK & Europe ?
This was a new concept to the UK transport world importing a new American type of business back in 1969, where hauliers etc could hire artic. trailers by the day, week, month or years and revolusionised the way many operated - particularly container & early TIR operators. I bet most of the members in this website have pulled or used hire company trailers at one time or another, emergency or everyday use ?
I was one of three starting the UK operation in 1969, and responsible for sales in Northern Europe. It obviously fulfilled a need and grew like topsy ! Within 3 years we had grown to offer a fleet of 3,500 trailers from just one depot in West Thurrock and double that number at Rotterdam. Others soon followed, Rentco, Willhire, Eurofleet, TIR, ICS etc etc
Hope that gets your thread off to a start Sgt Major
Hugh
I should have mentioned another, invented by my one time partner - the " Suzie " airline ?
Asain transport/astran pioneered middle east transport.
Jim mckelvie brought Volvo trucks to the uk.
Edward stobart you can knock him and the firm for lots of stuff but he did more to make trucks acceptable to The general public.
Thanks for the replies, Interesting about the Trailer rental companies I never gave them a thought !
Also would agree with Astran I didn’t think it would be long before there name cropped up
My input would be the humble container when you think about it, it changed not only transport
but the docks and quayside’s in the country, it also saved a lot of handling and cost hundred’s of jobs on the docks
around the world.
Regards
There was a great documentary on the container on Bbc 4 recently called the box that changed Britain. Well worth watching if you get the chance.
MAT transport were the first ever company to export built up cars. Before that the cars were exported in kits and built up at the destination. They actualy introduced containerisation. The containers were not as we know them now but containers never the less. I bet the dockers hated them!!!
Cliff
Whoever invented Pallets must be in there! When you think of all the handball they saved, although in the early days you would often have to hand ball it off! 
Sometime on to more pallets! 
Barbara Caste , she was the nitwit who introduced the 1968 traffic act ,which meant that every coalman/farmer/scap dealer /firewood merchant etc etc etc became hauliers overnight and it was all downhill from then on !!! .
Gerald Broadbent and the first Tautliner certainly had a huge influence, the landscape today looks very different thanks to him.
ROPE. 
OzzyHugh:
Hi Sgt Major - just to kick off this thread :What about T.I.P. trailer rental company, subsidiary of U.S. giant Transport International Pool - who was really the first major specialist trailer rental company in UK & Europe ?
This was a new concept to the UK transport world importing a new American type of business back in 1969, where hauliers etc could hire artic. trailers by the day, week, month or years and revolusionised the way many operated - particularly container & early TIR operators. I bet most of the members in this website have pulled or used hire company trailers at one time or another, emergency or everyday use ?
I was one of three starting the UK operation in 1969, and responsible for sales in Northern Europe. It obviously fulfilled a need and grew like topsy ! Within 3 years we had grown to offer a fleet of 3,500 trailers from just one depot in West Thurrock and double that number at Rotterdam. Others soon followed, Rentco, Willhire, Eurofleet, TIR, ICS etc etc
Hope that gets your thread off to a start Sgt Major
Hugh
You forgot to mention the infamous Robert Montague and Tiphook, although a little later in 1975 and eventually the owners of Central Trailers, Rentco and then Central Trailer Rentco. Unfortunately for Mr Montague he got his own money mixed up with the companies and had some business links with Robert Maxwell.
James Sherwood of Sea Containers and later GE Seaco must have been around in about 1968.
I fell out with TIP after they bought a specialist trailer rental firm from a friend of mine, it ruined it for me although I think he will be sitting fairly pretty now 
shugg:
Barbara Caste , she was the nitwit who introduced the 1968 traffic act ,which meant that every coalman/farmer/scap dealer /firewood merchant etc etc etc became hauliers overnight and it was all downhill from then on !!! .
Barbara Castle had a lot to answer for, apart from the Breathalyser, and seat belts, she introduced the permanent 70mph speed limit and carried out all the railway closures that Doctor Richard Beeching gets the blame for. He only wrote a report, she carried it out. Beeching worked for ICI before and after he wrote the Beeching Report.
Barbara Castle could not drive and was always chauffeured everywhere
The tacho. In the good old days when we had log books, with a stroke of the pen you could have started at anytime of the day and be anywear in the country. If you were realy enthusiastic you could have two log books going at the same time. It was aproblem getting rid of the excess milage, some Saturdays you could do 200 miles washing the motor in the yard.
Fairly diverse replies Thanks all, What about the inventor of Pneumatic Tyres !
When you look at the old timers in there trucks with solid rubber tyres that must have been
one hell of a bumpy ride and the roads were not to clever either !
When I first started driving in the 70’s modernity was creeping in and what we had was luxury
compared to years gone by
Regards
I think these lads have a lot to answer for.
It saved a lot of broken thumbs when there was a battery man enough to do away with a cranked handle.
I think Edwards Brothers had an important role in the industry. Where would we be without EDBRO?
Albert Dodgy , he was a good friend of Chris Webb.
Sweden…for obvious reasons…and ABBA…
Dodgy Permits.
Introduced in the late 60’s (?) that enabled the many new start up haulage company’s to start on the road to Europe & not forgetting lease hire that enabled these start ups to obtain a couple of units for 10bob down.
Bob? Heaton of Heatons of St Helens fought the good fight to get the stripping & stuffing of containers out of the grip of the 70’s dock labour scheme’s insistence that only docker’s could do that type of work wherever the box was being stripped or stuffed. 
IIRC it was a long and protracted dispute in which he eventually came out on top but along with the drivers strike of 79 brought about the demise of the company.
Regards
Dave Penn;