Sept/Oct 2003

Outspoken industry commentator Derek Beevor laid into germany's telematics-based road tolling scheme, which some see as a model for the uk, at a press gathering this summer. m.logistics was there

Telematics "will never work as a toll collection system." That confident assertion comes from outspoken industry commentator Derek Beevor, who heads up (and co-owns) software house Road Tech Computer Systems.

He maintains that the German motorway toll system, which was due to come into effect this summer (but has now been postponed until 2 November), is ill-founded and unnecessarily complex, and could be prone to evasion anyway.

Road Tech held open house to the press in the summer at an event where Beevor spelled out his concerns about the viability of the project ­ and about the UK Government's plans for a system which could be even more complex (and hence potentially unworkable).

 

He emphasised that he was not hostile to telematics as such, pointing out that Road Tech offered its own in-cab system (Cablink), and was launching a new low-cost mobile data system (see page 30).

"But what the Germans are introducing isn't a telematics solution," Beevor insisted. "It's a narrow-based toll collection and monitoring system."

By way of background, the German system will apply only to trucks of 12 tonnes gross and above, and only to journeys on autobahns. The German government has contracted operation of the system out to a consortium called Toll Collect, which is owned jointly by Deutsche Telekom (45 per cent), DaimlerChrysler (45 per cent) and Cofiroute, a company involved in toll administration in France (10 per cent).

Under the proposed scheme, operators can have their vehicles fitted with a free GPS-based in-cab tracking and communication system, which recognises when the vehicle starts and ends a motorway journey segment, and initiates a billing process automatically. This equipment is not mandatory, but drivers of vehicles without it will have to pre-book before embarking on the motorway segment of any journey. A network of 3,500 kiosk-based booking terminals has been built up.

This concept came in for particular criticism from Beevor, who predicted long queues and delays at the terminals. This would naturally push many operators towards fitting the in-cab system, he said ­ especially those believing the equipment could be used for other telematics functions.

This however will not be possible ­ at least in part because of European Union concerns that the suppliers would use the opportunity to corner the telematics market, to the detriment of their competitors. The initial on-board package is therefore limited to its toll-collection function.

How it evolves in future, though, still seems uncertain. Beevor considered a European Union decision taken in April to be little more than a "fudge", since it merely required Toll Collect to offer other telematics suppliers access to its system. "Suppliers don't want access," he pointed out, "they want to sell their own systems." There are still lingering concerns that ultimately the on-board systems could be adapted or enhanced to handle wider-ranging operational functions.

Beevor pointed out that 300 camera gantries had been fitted at German motorway access points. "So why do they need a telematics solution at all?" He compared the complexity of the German system with the relative simplicity of the London congestion charging scheme, where no on-board equipment is involved, yet no pre-booking is required either. Many commercial vehicle operators can pre-register their fleet, and simply be billed on the basis of photographs of their licence plates taken by enforcement cameras.

A further element in the German system is a fleet of 278 dedicated enforcement vehicles, which will travel the motorways, "listening" for a low-power short-wave "immunity" signal broadcast by the on-board units of every truck equipped with the Toll Collect package. Any vehicle detected without the signal or a pre-booking will be escorted off the motorway.

The final irony of the system, Beevor maintained, was that drivers might be able to block GPS signals to the on-board units anyway, and thereby thwart the self-billing process. The whole scheme, in his eyes, was "complete and utter nonsense".

That view is increasingly being taken by UK interests as the British Government winds itself up to introduce toll-based road charging by 2006. The assumption is that the UK will be obliged to follow the German example, and introduce a two-tier system involving either on-board equipment or a simpler pre-booking option. But the Road Haulage Association now maintains that this could not possibly accommodate variable-rate charging, which is a key plank in the UK Government's platform. The result, according to its chief executive Roger King, would be "administrative melt-down".

Meanwhile, Derek Beevor is no doubt quietly smiling to himself as the row goes on, looking in an increasingly strong position to say "I told you so" to anyone who should ask.

Wide variation in data transmission costs

What does it cost to transmit data around the world by wireless link? Derek Beevor had some of his guests gasping with amazement as he showed the extent of the disparity in the cost of sending 1 megabyte using various rival wireless technologies.

• Using a GSM data link over a mobile phone, which was charged at 10p per minute, he said that at a typical transmission rate of 9,600 baud, the cost could be up to £1,145 per megabyte.
• Using SMS (short messaging system), which cost 10p for up to 160 characters, the price came to £655 per megabyte. But since the average length of an SMS message was 40 characters, not 160, the real-life cost could be up to £2,621, he said.
• Using GPRS, which was available at a flat rate of £11 a month for transmitting up to 5 megabytes, the cost was £2.20 per megabyte ­ up to a thousand times cheaper than SMS.

Beevor pointed out that many telematics suppliers currently used SMS messages to transmit information such as vehicle position and status. Each transaction tended to involve several messages and response, so that the ultimate cost per transaction could come to 60p to 70p per transaction. "A lot of telematics providers are really SMS resellers," he maintained.

It should be pointed out that Beevor's sample costs were calculated to show the worst-case differences in cost. In reality, many telematics systems limit the number of messages they send. They may not hit a transaction rate anywhere near as high as 60p, and their data volume requirements may be measured in bytes and kilobytes, not megabytes. Nevertheless, Road Tech's examples served to highlight the possible variations in an industry going through a process of massive change.