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The Evolution of Cars and Roads

November 25, 2013 by · Leave a Comment 

Posted by Phineas Upham

“The Future of Driving,” by Tom Chiarella examines the development of cars and roads over the years. The author suggests that both haven’t changed much in the last hundred years. In an effort to discover what scientists and engineers are working on today, Chiarella goes on a quest to find “the future of driving.” First, he wants to know whether there is a flying car and/or if we’re close to getting there. The closest he gets to a flying car is in fact an airplane that drives. Invented by Carl Dietrich, the “Transition” is an SUV-sized plane with folding wings. Instead of a driver’s license, one would need a sport pilot’s license to drive or fly this vehicle.

Among other developments, Chiarella finds a very interesting project underway at the MIT Media Lab in Cambridge, the Smart Cities project. According to the article the project “studies ways cars and cities can intelligently respond to each other.” He describes a part of the project called the City Car, an engineless vehicle run by motors within wheel casters. It would be a fully automated, fully sensored vehicle with the ability to shift in all directions much like a desk chair.

Read more: http://www.esquire.com/features/best-n-brightest-2006/ESQ1206DRIVING_176_1

No Texting for Truck And Bus Drivers

May 20, 2010 by · Leave a Comment 

Earlier this year, the US Transportation Department announced a new guideline for commercial bus and truck drivers, banning them from texting while driving. The Secretary of the Department, Ray LaHood said that the new federal guidelines were introduced as safety on the roads was of absolute importance, and anything that could distract the drivers should be eliminated.

The new law came into place immediately. Bus or truck drivers caught texting while driving could be fined up to $2,750 – according to a press release issued by the Department of Transportation.

The Owner-Operator Independent Drivers’ Association extended their support towards the newly passed federal guideline, but raised concern about the decision to implement it immediately. The Association questioned the decision, stating that it had bypassed the usual processes with regards to implementing such laws – posing problems in terms of enforcement and implementation.

Even since LaHood took up the position as Secretary of the Department of Transportation, he has been constantly focused on dealing with ‘distracted’ drivers. In view of this, LaHood organized a two day summit regarding this issue in Washington in September 2009, and even launched a website (distraction.gov) to create awareness on the related dangers.

In January 2010, FocusDriven, an advocacy group created by Janet Froetscher, the President of the National Safety Council and Lahood was announced. It is a nonprofit move to support the families of victims of distracted driving.

Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration statistics indicate that for every six seconds spent texting, drivers spend an average of 4.6 seconds with their eyes off the road ahead of them.

GM to Set Up Pilot Hydrogen Infrastructure in Hawaii

May 7, 2010 by · Leave a Comment 

A pilot project recently announced by The Gas Company and General Motors will make Hawaii the first location in the United States to have infrastructure in place for hydrogen fuelling. The location is quite apt, as all the Hawaiian Islands are fairly small, which means you can never be too far away from the hydrogen fuelling stations. The isolation is also a key factor towards Hawaii being selected for testing this new technology in the transport industry.

TGC or The Gas Company has produced hydrogen and synthetic natural gas or SNG for the last few years. SNG is currently distributed to customers in the island through a network of pipelines. The SNG is mixed with 5% of hydrogen – which is sometimes increased as per the need.

GM’s new project will involve the setting up of a network consisting between 20 and 25 hydrogen filling stations located in Oahu. These fuelling stations will tap into the already existing network of pipelines. This would mean that every driver in the island will have access to a filling station within a mere drive of ten minutes. A pressure swing absorption system is used to separate pure hydrogen from the flow – which is then utilized to fill up fuel cell vehicles.

Hawaii will also benefit from this pilot project, as its isolation means fossil fuels must be imported, and that, at a premium cost as well. Grid stability is impossible as wind and sun are not constant, even though being plentiful. Thus, being able to store hydrogen gives Hawaii an advantage, especially with it being made from renewable sources. Hawaii’s goal in a generation is – to achieve 70% clean energy.

Supply Chain Executive Survey: Economic Recovery is Close, But Companies Not Fully Ready to Benefit

April 21, 2010 by · Leave a Comment 

A recent study of supply chain executives working for retail, high-technology, pharmaceutical and consumer product companies stated that a larger percentage expected the economy of the United States to make a turnaround in either the fourth quarter of 2009 or the second quarter of 2010.

Carried out in September 2009 in Chicago at the Supply Chain Leadership Forum, the survey indicates that approximately 40% expected GDP growth to be positive in 2010 while 30% expected the economy to ‘make it’ during the end of 2009.

Bruce Tompkins, Executive Director of the Supply Chain Consortium commenting on the results of the study said the outlook of the economy turnaround depended heavily on the industry itself. He further explained that the food and beverage sector was already witnessing some growth, while retail and high-tech industries were still waiting for positive growth figures to show.

The ‘Great Comeback’ seems to be commonly accepted to happen fairly soon, although over 90% of the respondents stated that they had not developed anything significant with regards to a ‘Comeback’ plan or any other related initiatives to take advantage of a better economy.

Tompkins pointed out that the smarter companies in the industry had already adopted a recovery model, way before their competitors. This model involves a strong recovery plan that not only takes into account the recession ending time, but also one that pushes them to the fore to achieve positive growth. Tompkins also stated that some companies that were heavily affected by the economic instability have also adopted fairly aggressive improvements to their supply chains in order to maximize on their positions in the competitive market.

Fedex Completes Acquisition of Watkins Motor Lines

April 10, 2010 by · Leave a Comment 

A recent corporate announcement by FedEx Corp confirmed the completion of the acquisition of Watkins Motor Lines and its related affiliates for an outright purchase of $780 million. Watkins Motor Lines is a private company, which is based in Lakeland, Fla. – and is one of the top providers of long haul LTL services, with annual revenue figures at over $1 billion.

The operations of the company include service centers numbering 140, and over 14,000 trailers and tractors – all of which will now be rebranded as FedEx National LTL and FedEx Freight Canada. The rebranding of both these operations is already underway.

Commenting on the recent acquisition, Frederick W. Smith, FedEx’s Chairman, President and Chief Executive Officer said that the FedEx group could now offer its customers even greater flexibility and value, especially in the ‘less than truckload’ sector. The purchase of Watkins Motor Lines, he said, would now enable FedEx to offer customers the highly requested long haul LTL services for sometime now. Customers will also have on offer bundled transportation solutions.

FedEx Freight Canada and FedEx National LTL both operate their own separate networks under the FedEx Freight sector. This sector also includes FedEx Custom Critical, FedEx Freight and Caribbean Transportation Services – with a grand total of 500 centers. Regional and long haul customer needs are met by around 54,000 tractors and trailers.

Douglas G. Duncan, FedEx Freight’s President and Chief Executive Officer said that the company was also working towards growing their LTL market share within North America.

The Basic Elements on a Courier Air Way Bill

March 27, 2010 by · Leave a Comment 

Let’s say that you send off a package as soon as possible to a distant country. So, what will you do? Hire a courier service, of course. There are several popular options these days with the likes of TNT N.V, DHL, Aramex, UPS and Fedex that will deliver messages, packages and mail and are known to provide a higher quality of service in comparison to normal mail services.

Since most people are very particular about how their goods move from point A to point B, the international courier provides its customers with a receipt that is evidence to prove that the courier is in the care of the international courier until it reaches its destination. This receipt is known as an airway bill which is always processed in three copies.

The first copy is signed by the shipper while the second copy is signed by both the sender and the carrier and is handed over to the person who receives the package. Finally, the third copy is finally signed by the carrier and handed over to the sender as Proof of Delivery (PoD).

The airway bill contains important information of the delivery which can be especially helpful if something goes wrong. Details are place and date of carriage contract, place of departure, name and addresses of the carrier, sender and the consignee, description and nature of goods as well as details of freight. Very importantly, the airway bill also has a tracking number which can be used to check the status of delivery, and current position of the shipment.

In most cases, the sender pays for the shipment unlike with some destinations where a cash-on-delivery (CoD) can be arranged for.

Sea Cargo Basics

March 27, 2010 by · Leave a Comment 

What globalization has done for the concept of free trade is what cargo ships have done for international trade. Not only has industrialization, outsourcing and the growth of the ‘multinational corporation’ increased international trade but advanced transportation has made it a lot easier too. Remarkably, a substantial amount of international trade occurs by transporting cargo by sea from one port to another.

With a life expectancy of about 25 to 30 years, cargo ships are designed differently from passenger ships purely for the purpose of carrying cargo, and are normally built using welded steel. Equipped with cranes and similar loading/ unloading equipment, these ships are classified based on their capacity, weight and dimensions and carry their cargo unpackaged.

Sea cargo is divided into two types such as dry and wet cargo, of which the former is transported using both bulk carriers and container ships whereas the latter uses tankers. Dry cargo consists of items such as wood chips, bauxite, coal, cement, grain (such as wheat, rice, soybeans, barley, oats, rye, sorghum, maize), iron, chemicals, dry edibles (such as sugar, livestock feed, seeds, flour) and bulk minerals. On the other hand, wet cargo consists of liquids such as gasoline, petroleum, liquefied natural gas (LNG), chemicals and liquid edibles such as fruit juices, vegetable and cooking oil.
Most large cargo ships are owned by businesses known as shipping lines, while smaller cargo ships (known as ‘coasters’) are often owned by independent operators. However, when it comes to international trade, the largest fleet of ships is owned by Greece accounting for 16 % of the world’s tonnage being transported around.

The Suez Canal

March 19, 2010 by · Leave a Comment 

As long as the 192 kilometer stretch of the Suez Canal is, it does bear a unique resemblance to Egypt’s lengthy preoccupation with water canals and the like. Remarkably, Napoleon Bonaparte and his team of cartographers and engineers found remnants of an ancient west-east canal running from the Red Sea all the way to the Nile. And being the pragmatic visionary, he desired to build a north-south canal that connected the Mediterranean Sea and the Red Sea.

However, it was not until the Suez Canal Authority in 1858 came into being to begin construction at its north terminal (Port Said) that this project was deemed a remote possibility.

But one might wonder why this route has turned out to be so important? Very simply, trading ships had to travel around Africa to get reach Europe from Asia and vice-versa. And much like the Panama Canal, this man-made waterway would reduce costs by minimizing the distance greatly apart from avoiding pirates along that route.

With the costs of building the canal almost double in comparison to its original estimate, the Suez Canal Authority found itself in financial difficulties when it opened in 17 November, 1869 and would not find favor as a popular shipping route for two years.

However, in the coming years, it would be part of an achievement that brought remarkable developments to world trade, as with the building of the American transcontinental railroad, the world could be circled in record time.

The canal currently allows ships up to 19 m or 210,000 deadweight tons at a maximum height of 68 m above water level, and since this limits supertankers from taking this route, plans to increase the draft to 22 m by 2010 are in progress.

Russia to Produce Large Cargo Airship

March 19, 2010 by · Leave a Comment 

Airships were widely used in the 1940s and were the first aircraft that made the idea of a controlled and powered flight a reality but soon declined in popularity due to their capabilities being overshadowed by airplanes, when it came to speed and maneuverability. However, they are still used today where the need to hover over a particular spot is required such as tourist ventures, advertising, camera platforms to view sporting events and so on and so forth.

Even though the credit has been given to Germany for creating the best series of these ‘lighter-than-air’ airships, Russia also launched its own ‘dirigible’ almost at the same time from St. Petersburg. However, in recent times, the Moscow-based RosAeroSistemy has embarked on an ambitious project which is to build a dirigible specifically for transport purposes with a capacity of 180 tons and with the ability to travel a distance of 9300 miles.

Based on the ideas of the space pioneer Konstantin Tsiolkovsky, the DT-N1 (Dirizhabl (zeppelin) Tsiolkovsky – #1) will be 268 meters long and 64 meters wide, which will cruise at a speed of 120 km/h and 179 km/h. Its all-metal body will contain a volume of 400,000 cubic meters, and will not be the first all-metal zeppelin to be produced in Russia.

What is heartening to know is that these zeppelins are not only economically but also ecologically friendly as compared to its ‘faster’ cousins, airplanes. With nine diesel engines to propel and balance the airship, its objective lies in transporting heavy and off-gauge loads that are too expensive or too difficult to be moved by means of conventional transport.

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US Export Regulations

March 14, 2010 by · Leave a Comment 

The export of goods from one country to another is subject to laws (read: regulations) just like anything else these days, and with the emphasis on legitimacy and profit, goods are watched ever so closely by governments as they are transported between borders either by mail, boat, air and with the growing importance of the internet, delivered as uploads and downloads.

These regulations differ from country to country, and in the U.S, these guidelines have been set up by the Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS), which is an agency of the United States Department of Commerce, and is also known as the Export Administration Regulations (EAR). Among other objectives of the BIS, its main aim is to further the interests of the national security, foreign policy and especially its economic initiatives.

Interestingly, their mission is to monitor and control ‘dual use’ items that are used commercially or in some cases could have military/ proliferation and commercial use as well. However, this does not mean that they have control over the export of all goods and services, as some specialized exports are handled by other U.S departments.

Most of your questions about export and the re-export of commercial items is found in the Federal Register under the section Code of Federal Regulations Title 15 chapter VII, subchapter C. Depending on which category the export/ re-export item is in, companies will need licenses to export their goods/ services and the restrictions may vary from country to country that they are exporting their goods/ services to based on the political status and agenda of the nation itself.

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