Craig Mackinlay, Member of Parliament for South Thanet covering Sandwich and the villages secured a one and a half hour Westminster Hall debate on the issue of inappropriate use of car Satellite Navigation systems within Heavy Goods vehicles, particularly by foreign drivers.
With the proliferation of free software for smartphones, and the low cost of portable sat-navs, geared up solely for car use, the temptation has been for HGV operators, particularly foreign drivers to use these cheaper alternatives rather than the bespoke HGV appropriate devices and software at a higher price.
Due to the unique problems faced across Kent due to foreign lorries entering the UK via the channel ports and tunnel, there are a higher volume of such lorries on Kent roads than anywhere else in the UK. In the debate, the MP highlighted the changes to the GPS Sat-Nav market and the countless cases of damage to historic listed buildings in Sandwich, particularly around Breezy Corner and The Barbican with 40 tonne HGVs regularly causing damaging blockages to the town, sometimes lasting hours all because the Sat-Nav has dictated so. The A257 between Sandwich and Canterbury has similar problems and is a regular complaint of the A257 Advisory group
The UK’s Freight Transport Association has been at the forefront of advising its 15,000 members to purchase HGV quality Sat-Navs and advises its members of appropriate routes to take.
The Transport Minister, Claire Perry MP welcomed Craig Mackinlay’s proposals for manufacturers to voluntarily introduce a Lorry feature as standard on all devices and within all software and announced a nationwide £3m Ordnance Survey digital mapping project, with widths, heights and other road features, at high resolution, being made available as open source, free data to all digital mapping companies to enhance the quality of base maps used within devices.
Craig Mackinlay said “Inappropriate Sat-Navs cause physical, economic and potential danger when used by HGVs.
I am encouraged that Ordnance Survey is spending £3 million on open source mapping, which could be vital to further improving the quality of data available to mapping companies.
It is my hope that mapping companies will make full use of this information and use this data to support a lorry specific option on sat-navs; which would solve at a stroke a number of the main problems.
Additionally I have been encouraging Kent County Council to provide maps for free at ports of entry, which clearly highlight the strategic road routes that should be used, and clearly mark the towns and villages that should be avoided.”