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Ever tried to imagine what it would have been like to undertake haulage work thousands of years ago? You wouldn’t have worn any kind of uniform representing your company, that’s for sure. Perhaps some rags or crudely fashioned clothes would have sufficed. Furthermore, the engine would have been a long time away still, so you would have had to find another way to transport your load! Aside from your mode of transport, the roads would have been very different too. In fact, if you go back thousands of years you wouldn’t have had the luxury of roads at all! Instead you would have had dirt tracks (if you were lucky), probably with plenty of potholes to contend with. When you think about the evolution of our modern day roads, it makes those of us carrying out haulage work appreciate the conditions we enjoy today. Certainly, a vehicle may break down occasionally and bad weather may make it harder to get from A to B, but it will still be far easier than the conditions people had to contend with many thousands of years ago. The advent of the wheel The wheel is often said to be the single most important thing mankind has ever come up with. Many would agree with this, certainly many people in the haulage industry would nod their heads in agreement! Mesopotamia is thought to be the place where the wheel was first thought of, but regardless of its origins there is no doubt the wheel would have changed the way we transported goods. Haulage work did not exist back then in anything like the same way it does now, but transportation certainly received a big boost when the wheel became more widespread across the world. The wheel leads to better roads Many people think of the wheel as the primary reason transporting goods became easier. But as well as leading to a variety of wheeled transport to get from A to B with our loads, it also inspired the building of much better roads to travel on. After all, even today we know the consequences of driving on bad roads – they can cause punctures and damage to tyres and wheels quite easily indeed. Back then, roads were little more than dust tracks, so it became clear better roads were needed in order for haulage work to become easier to manage. Basically everything has stemmed from there – improvements of all kinds made over centuries have made our lives easier as humankind has developed. Today it is easy to take our roads for granted. But just imagine what life would have been like all those years ago, when the transport industry consisted of carts, horses and people on foot. Things have changed a lot since then, and they will change and improve more in the future as well. Author Plate Norman Dulwich is a Correspondent for Haulage Exchange, the leading online trade network for the road transport industry across the UK and Europe. It provides services for matching haulage work and to buy and sell road transport and haulage contracts in the domestic and international markets.
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