Wit, wisdom, adventure, and revelations from sixty years on the road. They say that only truck drivers experience the true grandeur and landscape of America: the winding mountainsides at sunrise, the first frosts of winter descending on apple orchards, the call of the rising roosters. In A Trucker's Tale, Ed Miller gives an inside look at the allure of the work and the colorful characters who haul our goods on the open road. He shares what it was like to grow up in a boisterous trucking family, his experience as an equipment officer in Vietnam, the wide range of vehicles he's mounted, and the daily trials, tribulations, risks, and exploits that define life as a trucker. Ed's vibrant, no-holds-barred tales are hilarious and heartwarming, sometimes cringeworthy or unbelievable—recollections of heroic feats as well as the “fishing stories� that have stretched and shifted from CB radio to CB radio. Many are the results of what he calls “just plain stupidity.� Others bring to light the small acts of kindness and grand gestures that these Knights of the Highway perform each day, as well as the safety risks and continual danger that these essential workers endure. Together they paint a compelling portrait of one of the most important but least-known industries and reveal why Ed, and so many like him, just kept on truckin’.

The coming of the railways in the 1830s killed off the stage-coach trade; almost all rural roads reverted to low-level local use. Cyclists were the first group in a generation to use roads and were the first to push for high-quality leadership for roads. They were also the first promoters of motoring; the first motoring journalists had first been cycling journalists; and there was a transfer of technology from cycling to motoring without which cars as we know them wouldn't exist! 64 car marques, including Rolls-Royce, Aston Martin, Chevrolet, Cadillac and GMC, had bicycling beginnings. Roads Were Not Built for Cars is a history book, focussing on a time when cyclists had political clout, in Britain and especially in America. The book researches the Roads Improvement Association - a lobbying group created by the Cyclists' Touring Club in 1886 - and the Good Roads movement organised by the League of American Wheelmen in the same period.

The range of manufacturers is surprisingly wide, including: Case, Claas, Deutz-Fahr, International Harvester, John Deere, Laverda, Massey Ferguson, New Holland, Ransomes, Sampo and Wintersteiger. Some of the manufacturers have several models shown, with Claas particularly well represented. Each of the photographs has a full right-hand page. Opposite it is a concise text that describes the model's attributes and gives details of its range. The author describes the company ownership as well as country of assembly or manufacture. Cut-away diagrams showing the layouts of the three main combine types supported by a glossary of technical terms make this the ideal book for a novice enthusiast.

AEC Lorries explores the story of lorry use in the last fifty years, showing the diverse use of the vehicles and their configurations for many different types of work, with a focus on one of the great British manufacturers - AEC. AEC lorries have always been held in high esteem at home and abroad because of their powerful engines, and relative simplicity. They were to be found in many large and small fleets, capable of any type of work. A large proportion of AEC production was exported, particularly to British Commonwealth countries, where they endured hostile climates, severe overloading, and abuse on poor roads; nevertheless, they remained as good working equipment. It has been said by many in the transport sector that, if AEC engines had been developed, rather than other types within the British Leyland range, AEC vehicles would have become a range of lorries and buses that were second to none. Lorries are now the lifeblood of the nation and, without them, our lives would be much less rich. Railways have always been of great interest, but road transport, in its many forms and diverse liveries, has become an object of enthusiastic interest. This book looks to explore one of the most iconic and recognisable brands of British roads, using 180 rare and unpublished images.

The aim of this series is to appeal to readers of all ages, perhaps for different reasons...In this volume: We travel back to the year 1968, as ever an eventful year, that included:* The end of steam on British Rail * Martin Luther King shot * Seator Kennedy shot * Matt Busby knighted * * UKs first heart transplant * 1st & 2nd class mail introducedFor the younger reader there are wonderful pictures of buses and coaches that they will never have seen. There will, for example, be half-cab single and double deckers the like of which are no longerin production. Some will be recognised from models and books, while others will be seen for the first time. For the older reader the books are designed to build into a collection placing the road transport in the context of key events thus providing an historical perspective of travel in times past. For those old enough to remember the years depicted, the series will, we hope, provide reminders for many of school days, time perhaps spent bus-spotting, depot visiting and generally visiting interesting locations! The books also make ideal theme gifts for the year of birth, marriage, retirement, starting work and other such events in life.

From an acclaimed author and a New York Times Best Illustrated artist comes the fascinating, little-known—and true!—story of New York City’s first subway.

New York City in the 1860s was a mess: crowded, disgusting, filled with garbage. You see, way back in 1860, there were no subways, just cobblestone streets. That is, until Alfred Ely Beach had the idea for a fan-powered train that would travel underground. On February 26, 1870, after fifty-eight days of drilling and painting and plastering, Beach unveiled his masterpiece—and throngs of visitors took turns swooshing down the track.

The Secret Subway will wow readers, just as Beach’s underground train wowed riders over a century ago.

This is one of four volumes covering the history of British Trolleybus systems. This book looks at the networks in Yorkshire. Bradford and Leeds were the pioneering systems in the country and, more than six decades later, it was Bradford that was to the final bastion of this once important form of transport. The author is an authority on tram and trolleybus systems, with a series of books already published on the history of British and Irish tram networks. This volume covers the history and background surrounding the networks looking at the reasons why they were opened and why they eventually closed down.

Here, Volkswagen enthusiast and prolific author Richard Copping examines, for the first time, the complete story of the T4 from the Transporter concept originated forty years before its presence at VW's Hanover factory, through its development period and full production life. Topics covered include: the background story 1949-1990; design concept to production in the 1980s; full analysis of the T4's specifications; face-lifted Caravelles and Multivans from 1996 onwards; petrol- and diesel-aspirated engines including the VR6, V6 and 2.5 litre TDI; the T4 story in the USA - the Euro Van and finally camping conversions.

Haynes disassembles every subject vehicle and documents every step with thorough instructions and clear photos. Haynes repair manuals are used by the pros, but written for the do-it-yourselfer.

The city of York stands at the confluence of the rivers Ouse and Foss on flat arable land called the Vale of York, which is bordered to the west by the Pennines, to the northeast by the North York Moors and to the east by the rolling Yorkshire Wolds. Outside the city are many beautiful small country villages and bus operators were needed to provide services linking these local villages and towns with York, especially on market days. Consequently, routes were very rural, and besides catering for the traditional market day shoppers, they often carried a considerable volume of passengers to work in York. This book, the follow-on to York Independent: Eastern Stage Bus Operators, tells the story of stage bus companies, including Hopes Motor Services, Hutchinson Brothers, Reliance Motor Services, G E Sykes & Son and Majestic of Cawood, who operated from the west of York. Including over 150 photographs, many in color, it shows how most of the companies covered started out as family-based operators running a service to the nearest local market town before expanding to offer excursions and private hires. It also shows how changes to the way of life, including the growth of car ownership, eventually killed off the majority of them.

During 1990-94, many locomotive classes became extinct, but new builds helped to redress the balance. Speedlink ended, but the first Eurostars appeared. In the final year, 1994, the Channel Tunnel opened. All these developments and more are chronicled here, using superb pictures by some of the country's leading photographers to record the end of an important railway era.

Although there had been experiments with the use of a new form of transport - the trackless tram' (better known as the trolleybus) - during the first decade of the 20th century, it was in June 1911 that Bradford and Leeds became the country's pioneering operators of trolleybuses. Some of the earliest operators were in Lancashire, northern England and Scotland; indeed Scotland can lay claim to having both the first system in Britain to close - Dundee in 1914 - and the last to open - Glasgow in 1949. This volume - one of four that examines the history of all trolleybus operators in the British Isles - focuses on Lancashire, Northern England, Scotland and Northern Ireland.

Trams, Buses, and Rails recounts the unique and little-known 130-year history of Bangkok's transportation system, from the first horse-powered tramway in 1888 to the mass transit urban railway of the twenty-first century. Using government archives and annual reports, the author deftly pieces together long-buried records and statistics to reconstruct the transportation policies of each successive metropolitan and national administration. He highlights the politicization and regulation of Bangkok's transport systems over the decades, and uncovers a series of setbacks, reversals, duplications, revisions, and cancellations that help to explain Bangkok's continuing transportation woes. A series of maps and tables elucidate the development of transportation routes and the rise and fall of the city's trams, railways, and bus lines.

Long Hard Road: The Lithium-Ion Battery and the Electric Car provides an inside look at the birth of the lithium-ion battery, from its origins in academic labs around the world to its transition to its new role as the future of automotive power. It chronicles the piece-by-piece development of the battery, from its early years when it was met by indifference from industry to its later emergence in Japan where it served in camcorders, laptops, and cell phones. The book is the first to provide a glimpse inside the Japanese corporate culture that turned the lithium-ion chemistry into a commercial product. It shows the intense race between two companies, Asahi Chemical and Sony Corporation, to develop a suitable anode. It also explains, for the first time, why one Japanese manufacturer had to build its first preproduction cells in a converted truck garage in Boston, Massachusetts. Building on that history, Long Hard Road then takes readers inside the auto industry to show how lithium-ion solved the problems of earlier battery chemistries and transformed the electric car into a viable competitor. Starting with the Henry Ford and Thomas Edison electric car of 1914, it chronicles a long list of automotive failures, then shows how a small California car converter called AC Propulsion laid the foundation for a revolution by packing its car with thousands of tiny lithium-ion cells. The book then takes readers inside the corporate board rooms of Detroit to show how mainstream automakers finally decided to adopt lithium-ion. Long Hard Road is unique in its telling of the lithium-ion tale, revealing that the battery chemistry was not the product of a single inventor, nor the dream of just three Nobel Prize winners, but rather was the culmination of dozens of scientific breakthroughs from many inventors whose work was united to create a product that ultimately changed the world.

The aim of this series is to appeal to readers of all ages, perhaps for different reasons... For the younger reader there are wonderful pictures of buses and coaches that they will never have seen. There will, for example, be half-cab single and double deckers the like of which are no longerin production. Some will be recognised from models and books, while others will be seen for the first time. For the older reader the books are designed to build into a collection placing road transport in the context of key events, thus providing an historical perspective of travel in times past. For those old enough to remember the years depicted, the series will, we hope, provide reminders for many of school days, time perhaps spent bus-spotting, depot visiting and generally visiting interesting locations! The books also make ideal theme gifts for the year of birth, marriage, retirement, starting work and other such events in life. In this volume: We travel back to the year 1978, as ever an eventful year, that included:

When the car was invented, it changed how we live. Learn about the first cars and how they changed the world.

The last three decades of the twentieth century saw dramatic changes in the bus industry with deregulation of bus services nationally in October 1986 in the provincial areas. Visually London seemed to stay the same with the buses still operating in the customary red liveries which all cherished from childhood. This book sets out to show how the vehicles moved forward from the traditional layout of rear platform and open half cab to the introduction of one man buses with their front entrances. The effects of deregulation are shown with dynamic colour schemes especially with the Bexleybus blue and cream colour scheme. With the passing of years we progress to the now familiar single deck buses, and also cover various other transport experiments.

First appearing in 1972, National Express coaches have become a familiar site on the UK's roads, and are very much a part of popular culture, celebrated in songs and on television. With many former National Express vehicles finding their way to preservation, this book explores the history of this very British brand and celebrates the history and heritage of a British institution. The book covers the operations of the business, the evolution of the National Express brand and the development of the fleet up to the latest Caetano Levante, a vehicle designed to meet the operator's very specific requirements for accessibility. Featuring driver stories and passenger memories, together with detailed images, photographs and designs, this book celebrates 50 years of coaching history.

An electric bicycle is, quite simply, a normal bicycle with an added battery and electric motor that just about double your pedal power - able to waft up hills and into headwinds, they take the sweat out of cycling, and give you supercharged legs! How long does the battery last? Are they expensive to run? Do you need a licence and insurance?This book is a complete buyer's guide to electric bicycles, and it answers all of these questions and more. Outlining the advantages (and pitfalls), with an overview of the types of bike available, what to look for, and why you should buy one, you'll also find useful contacts such as importers, websites and magazines, with advice on where you can ride and the law, including new legislation coming in 2017. Battery charging and maintenance is described, as well as some basic cycle maintenance, and there's an analysis of running costs and a look at the world of easy cycling they open up - electric bikes are not just for holidays.