Trucking industry

Road transport or road transportation is a type of transport by using roads. Transport on roads can be roughly grouped into the transportation of goods and transportation of people. In many countries licensing requirements and safety regulations ensure a separation of the two industries. Movement along roads may be by bike or automobile, truck, or by animal such as horse or oxen. Standard networks of roads were adopted by Romans, Persians, Aztec, and other early empires, and may be regarded as a feature of empires. Cargo may be transported by trucking companies, while passengers may be transported via mass transit. Commonly defined features of modern roads include defined lanes and signage. Within the United States, roads between regions are connected via the Interstate Highway System. Road transport or road transportation is a type of transport by using roads. Transport on roads can be roughly grouped into the transportation of goods and transportation of people. In many countries licensing requirements and safety regulations ensure a separation of the two industries. Movement along roads may be by bike or automobile, truck, or by animal such as horse or oxen. Standard networks of roads were adopted by Romans, Persians, Aztec, and other early empires, and may be regarded as a feature of empires. Cargo may be transported by trucking companies, while passengers may be transported via mass transit. Commonly defined features of modern roads include defined lanes and signage. Within the United States, roads between regions are connected via the Interstate Highway System. The nature of road transportation of goods depends, apart from the degree of development of the local infrastructure, on the distance the goods are transported by road, the weight and volume of an individual shipment, and the type of goods transported. For short distances and light, small shipments a van or pickup truck may be used. For large shipments even if less than a full truckload a truck is more appropriate. (Also see Trucking and Hauling below). In some countries cargo is transported by road in horse-drawn carriages, donkey carts or other non-motorized mode. Delivery services are sometimes considered a separate category from cargo transport. In many places fast food is transported on roads by various types of vehicles. For inner city delivery of small packages and documents bike couriers are quite common. People are transported on roads. Special modes of individual transport by road such as cycle rickshaws may also be locally available. There are also specialist modes of road transport for particular situations, such as ambulances. The first methods of road transport were horses, oxen or even humans carrying goods over dirt tracks that often followed game trail. The Persians later built a network of Royal Roads across their empire. With the advent of the Roman Empire, there was a need for armies to be able to travel quickly from one region to another, and the roads that existed were often muddy, which greatly delayed the movement of large masses of troops. To resolve this issue, the Romans built solid and lasting roads. The Roman roads used deep roadbeds of crushed stone as an underlying layer to ensure that they kept dry, as the water would flow out from the crushed stone, instead of becoming mud in clay soils. The Islamic Caliphate later built tar-paved roads in Baghdad. As states developed and became richer, especially with the Renaissance, new roads and bridges began to be built, often based on Roman designs. Although there were attempts to rediscover Roman methods, there was little useful innovation in road building before the 18th century. Starting in the early 18th century, the British Parliament began to pass a series of acts that gave the local justices powers to erect toll-gates on the roads, in exchange for professional upkeep. The toll-gate erected at Wade's Mill became the first effective toll-gate in England. The first scheme that had trustees who were not justices was established through a Turnpike Act in 1707, for a section of the London-Chester road between Foothill and Stony Stafford. The basic principle was that the trustees would manage resources from the several parishes through which the highway passed, augment this with tolls from users from outside the parishes and apply the whole to the maintenance of the main highway. This became the pattern for the turnpiking of a growing number of highways, sought by those who wished to improve flow of commerce through their part of a county. The quality of early turnpike roads was varied. Although turnpiking did result in some improvement to each highway, the technologies used to deal with geological features, drainage, and the effects of weather were all in their infancy. Road construction improved slowly, initially through the efforts of individual surveyors such as John Metcalf in Yorkshire in the 1760s. British turnpike builders began to realize the importance of selecting clean stones for surfacing while excluding vegetable material and clay, resulting in more durable roads. By the late 18th and early 19th centuries, new methods of highway construction had been pioneered by the work of three British engineers, John Metcalf, Thomas Telford and John Loudon McAdam, and by the French road engineer Pierre-Marie-Jérôme Trésaguet.