from flickr
Try beginning a chat with lots folk ( apart from the haulage firms ) about vans, and they are going to be asleep before you even get to debate the advantages of a mid-lift spindle. But it appears that there’s a new guard rising – a breed so dedicated and eagle-eyed, that they’re turning the talent of high speed number plate reading into a skill form. Well ok, there’s a little more to it than that. But what it adds up to is being in the right place at the right time, and being fast enough to be in a position to recognise or interpret the van make and model, the registration plate and the haulage companies’ identification.
This lot are clever, they’re patient and they’re heavy. So who are these lorry spotters? Are they bookish statisticians on their vacations from Cambridge? Or are they annoyed accountants floating around service stations in their macs with a secret taste to be truckies? Well no, according to the haulage companies’ they are just standard folks who happen to like vans – and if numbers quoted by the internet site lorryspotters.co.uk are anything to go by, the past-time is taking the United Kingdom by force. Hovering off a bridge over a busy highway as half of the world’s traffic sprays you with muddy road water ; or sitting on the side of the M1 as the other half of the planet’s traffic hurls empty coke cans at you isn’t everybody concept of fun.
But for the lorry spotter it is a rather good day out. Dictaphone in hand, pencil ready, these ardent hunter-gatherers slowly but certainly collect the info they need – make, model number, registration and the ultimate prize – the haulage companies’ identification.
In years yet to come “spotting the spotter” may become a past-time in its own right as when you start watching out for the lorry spotters, it becomes an engaging ability to spy them at work from their preferred hiding spots. ( Joke intended. ) the great thing about lorry spotting over, say train spotting is that it’s a moveable banquet. Not proscribed by the restraints of the train lines, you can travel openly to perform your research. There are naturally some especially favored spotting sites, generally concerning a motorway. Groups of spotters infrequently meet up at the crossing of the M5 and the M6 due to sheer volume of traffic. Haulage companies’ have stories of dedicated spotters who make round trips of almost eighteen hours simply to get another nick on their clip board! Www.lorryspotting.co.uk has over four thousand users who each pay £25 a year to join. The site has a database of over 13,000 wagons from just about one hundred haulage firms. The concept is to log on and record all the data from the vans you have spotted, and join the league table vying against other members for the most sightings. Naturally, it is not all about competition and impressing your favorite haulage firms, and many lorry spotters do it for their own satisfaction. The web is awash with sites where you can download footage of vans and trucks ; blogs and forums dedicated to lorry spotting ; and software meant to help you collect your spotting information. But the last mention would need to go to Alf Cooper – a well-known lorry spotter. Travelling up to forty thousand miles a year to chase his pastime, the 78 year-old died on the job one day. But his dedication paid off and 2 months after his passing he was still at number 2 on the league table.
Tags: lorry spotters, spotting the spotter, Wagon