Hi-cube height restriction hijack?

The row over the legality of transporting hi-cube containers (with a travel height of 4.5-4.6-metres) has now reached ministerial level, with a letter having been addressed to minister of transport, Sibusiso Ndebele, by the Durban harbour carriers’ division of the SA Association of Freight Forwarders (Saaff) in KwaZulu Natal. If the latest rulings on the subject are retained, this would “constitute a logistical and financial disaster of biblical proportions for South Africa”, according to the division’s vice-chairman, Kevin Martin, MD of specialised container carrier, Freightliner Transport. With contradictory rulings now abounding, about half the containers transported in SA – all being of the hi-cube type – will just have to be left standing. With current and proposed legislation, said Martin, and the road equipment presently available in this country, any trucker carrying these hi-cubes will be liable to be stopped, charged with illegal transportation, faced with the impounding of his vehicle and trailer, and possibly put out of business. “For over five years,” said the carriers’ letter to the minister, “we have been endeavouring to have the legislation changed, in order to accommodate the transportation of international hi-cube containers within SA.” And, at the moment, over 50% of all containers road transported in SA (in excess of 500 000 units a year) are hi-cube containers, Martin added, with a travel height of 4.5-4.6-m. “Through the department of transport (DoT) KZN task group,” he told FTW, “an international survey was undertaken by an independent consultant – at our expense – and supplied to the department.” In the interim, an unofficial moratorium has been placed on the offending section of legislation – one that restricts the travel height to 4.3-m for vehicles transporting hi-cube containers. “Further,” the letter told the minister, “we were told that a consultant would have to be appointed to study this issue before a final decision to change legislation would be undertaken (since suspended due to budgetary constraints). “Subsequent to this, new legislation proposed for the TRH 11, is that NO abnormal permits would be granted for the transportation of containers on abnormal vehicle (AV) registered equipment. In fact, no equipment would be eligible for registration as an abnormal if fitted with container locks.” This added further complications to an already troublesome situation – because current legislation expressly forbids containers to be transported, unless the vehicle is fitted with four, working container locks. A final compounding factor has now come into play, according to the truckers in the harbour carriers’ association. “It has come to our attention that the DoT has instructed all its provincial branches to start to implement the law as it now stands,” Martin said. “Vehicles are being fined and impounded and instructed to remove the container onto a legal trailer. “But, to all intents and purposes, these do not exist on SA roads – especially due to the TRH 11 ruling. This rules out low-bed type trailers, which are in the main AV registered equipment.” It’s an especially troublesome situation for SA’s major port city of Durban – with the container terminal in the port being the largest in the southern hemisphere. Hoping that the minister of transport will be able to rectify this monstrous problem, the Durban harbour carriers have “respectfully requested” that he reinstate the moratorium “as a matter of urgency until the way forward can be arrived at”.