No tears for hauliers over bridge closure

Sir, Scottish Labour’s Jackie Baillie and her new friends in the haulage business bemoaned the closure of the Forth Road Bridge and demanded the SNP’s Scottish Government reimburse them and their shareholders for the inconvenience of having to go a few miles out their way to their destinations.

Most of these heavy-hauled loads are heading south to the big cities in England, where many are based.

The failure of the bridge was down to a structural weakness, caused by a stress fracture.

Engineers also point out that the bridge was never intended to take the weight of some of these loads being hauled south by these hauliers. Many say the tolls might have saved the problem happening because the money would have been there to cover such problems, blaming the Scottish Government for removing them.

I wonder how many hauliers and shareholders, who would wish to save money, started using the bridge route once the tolls had been removed?

This would inevitably push weight and stress limits up.

Most of these companies are very capable of taking a ‘hit’ in the pocket every now and then, rather than use the public’s money to reimburse them.

Scottish Labour and their Scottish Liberal friends in government before opposed bridge maintenance funding and the building of a second crossing so they are right ones to carp about recent events.

The ‘bitter sweet victory’ that some columns mention for an early opening of the bridge to light public and commercial traffic must stick in the craw of the hauliers and a vengeful Scottish Labour with Baillie at the helm. If hauliers were charged for the extra weight they carry over the Forth Road Bridge, they would soon be smarting. Crocodile tears are shed for them on this one I’m afraid.

After all, the price of fuel is now at its lowest for seven years and the route south remains the same for most via the M74 via Kincardine.

I do, however, feel sorry for those whose businesses sat on a knife edge as a result of the closure and the low-waged drivers of the haulage industry.

Bob Harper, Anstruther, Fife.