Road transport - Great Britain: books - vehicles and history (1/3)

British Livestock Lorries

Long before motorised transport, movement of animals was by means of walking individual beasts, or by herding or droving. Much of the road system around Britain evolved from the routes taken by the drovers and their herds. With the coming of the railways, animals for market went by train.
This type of traffic was a good income for the railways, with their mass or bulk transport facility.

In the early twentieth century, livestock haulage was slow in starting, mainly because the lorries of the time were small and couldn't compete with the railways. However, by the 1930s larger and stronger lorries were available and local livestock haulage became a viable proposition, eventually taking over from the railways entirely.
Livestock road haulage was usually done with a basic platform lorry and a demountable livestock container. These could be anything from home-built to coachbuilt types by specialist builders. The construction was usually in hardwood, until the advent of steel and aluminium.
In more recent times, much larger and more powerful vehicles have evolved to cater for animal welfare and driving time.

With the diverse range of appearances and colour schemes seen on these vehicles over the years, Bill Reid's terrific array of photographs will fascinate lorry enthusiasts and agriculture enthusiasts alike.

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British Tipper Lorries

Tipper lorries have been part and parcel of road transport since the beginnings of the age of motor vehicles. In fact their roots are in horse-drawn carts, which were built to tip by balance and gravity.
For many years, and probably still today, the tipper lorry was seen as a dirty, well-worn, poorly maintained and overloaded example of road haulage, not particularly beloved by the general public.

As they are used in all forms from lightweight four-wheelers to maximum capacity artics, carrying almost any commodity that could be loaded in bulk, tipper lorries could be said to be the backbone of British industrial requirements.
All makes of lorries have been used as tippers, with no exceptions, providing a great variety for the road transport enthusiast. Many endure short, hard-worked lives, while others soldier on to greater longevity, perhaps engaged in long-distance work.

As time has passed, lorries have been allowed to carry more weight and become larger and, as a consequence, more powerful. For the transport enthusiast this brought an even bigger variety of types, up to 44 tonnes gross weight, which Bill Reid, with nearly 200 unpublished images, shows in this fascinating book.

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Local Authority Vehicles since the 1970s

Since the early 1970s, significant changes have occurred in local government. In 1974, county boroughs, urban districts, and rural districts were replaced by district or borough councils under county councils.
Local authorities took charge of various services within their boundaries, such as road construction, maintenance, cleansing, refuse collection, disposal, parks, playing fields, education, and social services.
In the 1980s, competitive tendering led to the outsourcing of many services to private companies or operated by in-house labor groups. Another reorganization in 1996 established unitary authorities responsible for all services in their areas, akin to county borough councils before 1974.

A wide range of vehicles, from pedestrian-operated pavement sweepers to articulated units, were utilized for these tasks. This book examines the vehicles employed by local authorities across Britain since the 1970s, spanning from Devon to Scotland.

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Milk Transport

Distribution of milk started from cow houses in the city, or farms using horses and carts. Later, milk was collected in milk churns, which the farmer left on a milk stand at the farm gate and which were collected by a lorry for delivery to the dairy. Milk also used to be moved on the railways, from sidings to dairies around the country.
The Milk Marketing Board (MMB) was formed in 1933 and sold the milk to the dairies on behalf of the farmers. In the early years, the milk industry also saw some big names including Co-Op, Express, Unigate and United Dairies, who all had their own transport.

In 1993 the government ordered the abolishment of the MMB to allow free competition in the milk industry. This gave the dairies a chance to have their own transport to move bulk milk. At the same time the company Milk Marque was formed, which had the job of moving all the milk which wasn't supplied directly to the dairy companies.

Using 180 rare and previously unpublished images, Nigel Scaife tells the story of transport and milk.

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Tankers on British Roads

Road tankers come in many forms, with certain goods very often dictating the type and shape.
The transport industry has adapted many innovations over the years and a wide variety of examples have travelled on our roads over the years - powder tanks, tanks for liquids, and even specialised tanks for the carriage of a plethora of goods from live eels to animal feed, cement, plastic pellets and more.

All of the images in this book were captured by the author over a number of years. They document an important part of our transport history and will delight enthusiasts and modellers alike.

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Working lorries (Lorries illustrated)

This collection of over 100 images records a snapshot of the British road haulage scene of the 1990s when models such as Foden, ERF and Seddon Atkinson were widely to be seen alongside still-common marques including Scania, DAF and Volvo. Detailed captions provide vehicle, haulier, livery and cargo information.

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