Royal Mail to replace thousands of bicycles with vans

[TrueBlueTerrier]

http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/b ... 251923.ece" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

The sight of a postman pedalling down the street will become much rarer under plans by the Royal Mail to phase out thousands of bicycles and replace them with vans.

The distinctive red bicycles will be removed from service and shipped by charities to Africa. The Royal Mail believes that rounds will be completed more quickly by using vans carrying up to three postal workers.

Environmental groups have criticised the plans, querying why the Royal Mail would replace a sustainable form of transport with one that causes congestion and is dependent on fossil fuels. Bicycles have been used to deliver post since 1880 and the Royal Mail has more than 16,000, made by the British company Pashley.

Staff fear potential redundancies and the closure of some delivery offices. Those using the vans will work together to deliver post across a neighbourhood before driving on to the next location. Many homes will no longer have a single, dedicated postal worker.

Workers on bicycles often have to return to delivery offices to pick up more mail because there is a limit to what they can carry. Staff using vans would carry mail for several rounds.

The Royal Mail has chosen several cities to test the plan, including Cambridge, Plymouth, Durham and Lincoln. Staff at the Lincoln delivery office walked out in unofficial strike action in March in protest at the proposed introduction of 72 shared vans.

In Cambridge, where cyclists outnumber drivers in the centre, dozens of Royal Mail bicycles are due to be replaced. Margaret Wright, a Green councillor on Cambridge City Council, said: “The bicycle is ideally suited to the job of delivering mail. You can park them anywhere and they don’t cause any congestion. Even during this winter’s severe snow, the post continued to be delivered by bike.

“People like to see their familiar postman cycling along. It is madness to remove bikes and replace them with polluting vans.”

While most of the vans will be powered by diesel, the Royal Mail is experimenting with electric vans that emit no air pollutants. Postal workers in East Oxford are using an egg-shaped electric minivan with a range of about 30 miles.

Bicycles are used on a quarter of the country’s 65,000 delivery routes.

A Royal Mail spokesman said: “We continue to look at ways we can deliver the mail as efficiently as possible to our customers.” Asked how many bicycles were likely to be removed, the spokesman said: “Nothing has been decided.”

Bob Gibson, national official of the Communication Workers Union, said: “Royal Mail plans to bring in thousands of vans right across the country, replacing the majority of cycle and foot routes in towns and cities. This will be a disaster unless the company takes a structured approach to rolling this out.

“We support in principle the introduction of vans on delivery because it gets weight off the shoulders of postal workers and would remove thousands of private cars from delivery routes. However, vans are not suitable for every route or for every town, with Cambridge being a good example.”

The Royal Mail has donated more than 12,000 bikes to the charity Re-Cycle since 1997. Re-Cycle ships the bikes to Ghana, Liberia, Namibia and South Africa.

[dvbuk55]

I repair our cycles - when I began about five years ago we had 57 cycles - some pretty tatty ones and about 40 were in use - we now have twelve and 9 are in use, we probably had about 15/16 or so vans, used through the day so some would be used for late duties and therefore be utilised more efficiently and have less down time, we now have 35. Which by and large will be stood idle most of the time because of the duty structures. There's modernisation for you.

[dvbuk55]

The yard at our DO can barely cope with current vans we have at present as it is a shared yard. Introducing further vans would raise serious congestion as well as health and safety issues. Is this yet another example of RM finding because it works in minority situations they feel able to apply it the length and breadth of the country without proper assessment?

Sorry I should have added that we have a new build approx 8 years ago, the intention was it would fit the vans and all private cars, but of course it doesn't now - our original office was a real problem fitting the original vans in a miniscule parking space.

[madelin4]

I think a lot of posties will not get along well working together out on the road...What happens if one person faster than the other? I cant see it being a good idea.

[axeman]

Your only as fast as the slowest !!!
I for one have no intention of going fast why for what reason only to have extra work thrust upon you ..... wise up before it's too late

[dvbuk55]

I think a lot of posties will not get along well working together out on the road...What happens if one person faster than the other? I cant see it being a good idea.

You would be right to assume that and there have been changes to accommodate "difficulties" but by and large it has settled down, however there is still some problems in completing these overblown van duties even after 8 months. At the time there wasn't any guidance from HQ as to what was and wasn't agreed and everyone assumed that this came under the "modernisation" - now that the LTB has been published with guidelines it may well be easier to refuse to implement on the various points made.