Productivity policy in freight often focuses on bigger themes such as capacity, network access, resilience and cost. But one of the most immediate pressure points for operators sits much closer to the ground: queueing and dwell time at depots, ports, distribution centres and customer sites. As industry policy bodies, including the ALC, continue pressing for more efficient supply chains, operators should be ready to show that better queue management is also a heavy vehicle safety issue.
The reason is simple. Uncontrolled waiting time does not stay contained at the gate. It flows into the rest of the transport task. A driver held unexpectedly for loading or unloading may lose lawful rest opportunities, face compressed travel windows later in the shift, arrive at the next site outside booked access times, or encounter pressure to recover time through unsafe choices. Yard congestion can also create local risks around reversing, pedestrian interaction, trailer movements, and rushed loading completion.
Under the HVNL, parties whose actions influence the task have duties to ensure safety so far as is reasonably practicable. That makes queue management more than a customer-service concern. If a site regularly creates extended, poorly managed delays but the transport chain treats them as normal, there may be a real question about whether the system is allowing safe compliance with fatigue, speed, loading and general safety duties.
This is especially important where businesses rely on highly sequenced runs. A delay that appears minor at one facility can unravel multiple deliveries, rest breaks and pickup commitments downstream. The operator may end up spending significant effort managing fatigue amendments or rescheduling, when the root problem is site access design and poor coordination.
Operators should collect stronger evidence about delay causes and safety consequences. Record queue start and finish times, loading and unloading duration, booking accuracy, missed slots, access restrictions and the compliance impacts that follow. Where possible, distinguish between ordinary operational variability and recurring structural delay. That evidence is useful internally, but it is also what makes a stronger case in industry and customer discussions about practical reform.
There are also direct controls worth implementing now. Use realistic booking buffers, pre-arrival check-ins, overflow parking protocols, and clear rules for when delayed tasks must be rebooked instead of pushed through. Make sure schedulers can escalate site delays without the default answer being to “make it work”. If your contracts or service levels penalise late performance but ignore queue-driven safety risk, they deserve review.
The broader policy conversation about freight productivity will continue, but the operators with the strongest voice will be those who can connect efficiency reform to measurable safety outcomes. Queue management is a strong example of where those interests align.
If your business wants a more consistent way to capture delay evidence, manage scheduling impacts and show practical CoR controls across sites and jobs, the COR Safety Management Systems platform can help turn daily operational friction into usable compliance management.