Toilet Rolls - Now Petrol/diesel!

[FairTmiddlin]

Just been on local amateur radio repeater and having a chat room talk.

Seems the only place local is in the next town, at Tesco and the queue is 3/4 of a mile long. So much for the crisis slowing down.

I was supposed to be going to Norfolk on Thursday, but that now looks off the list.

 

[rightsaidfred]

28 minutes ago, annv said:

Yes you are right it wont suit all, they will have to have a plan B or move house most planning these days require of street parking. John

Except for London where most new builds are large high rise blocks of flats holding hundreds of units at a time and a majority of roads of terraced houses have very little or no frontage, sorry but electric for the majority is never going to work it is just a short term quick fix to pacify the vocal extremists.

Fred

[annv]

Hi Fred BUT!  London does have very good public transport so car use can be minable as against Neatershead no public transport but lots of street parking and car use essentially. John

[Bikertov]

28 minutes ago, annv said:

Hi Fred BUT!  London does have very good public transport so car use can be minable as against Neatershead no public transport but lots of street parking and car use essentially. John

That's not quite the case in London.

There are often good links into and out of Central London, but not around/across the suburbs. You often have to travel in to get back out, to somewhere that is only a few miles away as-the-crow-flies.

[rightsaidfred]

39 minutes ago, annv said:

Hi Fred BUT!  London does have very good public transport so car use can be minable as against Neatershead no public transport but lots of street parking and car use essentially. John

Public transport is ok for commuting for some but for many of us especially the elderly or disabled cars are a necessary part of everyday life, many who do not live in London seem to have  a total misconception of what it is really like, the same probably applies to many cities, I have an image of the ideal of rural life which probably doesn't match reality, many of us travel out of London not further into  not least of which is travelling to the boat,

Sadly our Mayor and many politicians local and national seem to forget many of us can't cycle or walk everywhere and our lives don't fit into the little boxes they have ticked for us, people are diverse their lives are diverse their needs are diverse and most have earned the right to live their lives in the manner of their choosing and with which they are comfortable.

Fred

[Andrewcook]

I begin to wonder if and when this stupid panic buying of Petrol is going to Stop? As I and others going up to Norfolk as I will be going to the Broads at the end of the week for the First time this year thank goodness with out the Lock Down that prevented me from going in March 2021 so come what may I will be up there by the Weekend.

[Bikertov]

7 minutes ago, Andrewcook said:

I begin to wonder if and when this stupid panic buying of Petrol is going to Stop? As I and others going up to Norfolk as I will be going to the Broads at the end of the week for the First time this year thank goodness with out the Lock Down that prevented me from going in March 2021 so come what may I will be up there by the Weekend.

Surely once everyone has filled their tanks, they can't fill them anymore, so the panic buying will stop ?

I reckon on average, people have 1/2 a tank of fuel - some have more, some less, so an average.

As, say, 90% are panic buying, once they are full it will last an average of 2 weeks (for instance, I use a tank every 3 weeks).

So it can't go on for more than a few more day ??

[floydraser]

The BBC are winning at the moment. They tried for weeks to get us to panic buy food by repeating that CO2 was in short supply. That didn't work so they turned to petrol and we took the bait.

At lunchtime instead of just mentioning the fact they is no shortage, they just kept telling us there are still long queues everywhere; fanning the flames. They are ignoring the real facts causing the driver shortage (wages and conditions) and trying to keep it political. I notice there are very few lorry drivers interviewed considering they are at the centre of it.

[Heron]

I bought chicken thighs in our Tesco recently and was surprised looking at the packs that it was all EU origin, not British.

Now we know HMG is to provide 5500 visas for poultry workers, the penny dropped! I think the BBC and other media have got this just about right, in the UK we really do need to stop burying our heads in the sand, the reality is out there for all to see.

[RumPunch]

1 hour ago, Bikertov said:

Surely once everyone has filled their tanks, they can't fill them anymore, so the panic buying will stop ?

I reckon on average, people have 1/2 a tank of fuel - some have more, some less, so an average.

As, say, 90% are panic buying, once they are full it will last an average of 2 weeks (for instance, I use a tank every 3 weeks).

So it can't go on for more than a few more day ??

Managed to fill up on the way home. 12 gallons - will last me a week

[DAVIDH]

1 hour ago, Bikertov said:

Surely once everyone has filled their tanks, they can't fill them anymore, so the panic buying will stop ?

As more people have trouble filling up, they will learn the lesson that it's not a good idea to wait until you're down to a few miles worth of petrol. I suspect people will fill up weekly where they can, so prolonging the shortages. Local BBC just reporting that out of 20 stations they called at random, 13 were out of both petrol and diesel today. 

[Hylander]

32 minutes ago, DAVIDH said:

As more people have trouble filling up, they will learn the lesson that it's not a good idea to wait until you're down to a few miles worth of petrol. I suspect people will fill up weekly where they can, so prolonging the shortages. Local BBC just reporting that out of 20 stations they called at random, 13 were out of both petrol and diesel today. 

Since the year 2000 nonsense I never let my fuel go down under a half before filling up.  Once bittern and all that. 

 

 

[Meantime]

Went shopping earlier on and gave up with my first choice as the roads were gridlocked caused by people queuing on the roads to get fuel. Went to Sainsburys in the town centre in the end as their petrol station was closed due to no fuel, and hence traffic had a chance to flow. Just been out to see my brother and Sainsburys must have just had a delivery. Forecourt open, all pumps open and not a car in sight. Was tempted to stop but I still have over half a tank and no long journeys planned till next week. Hopefully I don't regret it, but that's all that's needed is for people to act normal and stay away from the garages unless they really need fuel. 

[SwanR]

We've booked a home delivery slot for our shopping this week. Only cost us £2. As both the Tesco's we use have petrol stations, and would also mean going past other garages on the way, we decided that there was no need to be held up by traffic should there still be queues later in the week. And as we have half a tank there's no need to fill up ourselves at the moment. We've nowhere much that we have to go.

[Mouldy]

‘Nuff said!! 😉

[marshman]

Part of the trouble is individuals now do what has been the downfall of many companies recently - everything in their lives is done on a "just in time" basis!! Why waste any money on fuel until the red light comes on?

I am much more old fashioned and operate the other way - fill up, use half a tank or so and then top it up. Perhaps industry should hold stock but no, virtually all industry does it the other way round! 

I blame accountants!!!!!

[SteveO]

Our current supply arrangements are too global, too interconnected and not sufficiently resilient. The world seems to be lurching from shock to shock and each shock now seems to affect everyone. We need to have more by way of fire-breaks , more safety stocks,  more checks and balances, more flexibility and a much better appreciation of what constitutes "strategic infrastructure". This probably flies in the face of the current "just in time" philosophy but maybe that has been rolled out beyond the point where it is useful.

[Bikertov]

Just in time is all about saving money:

- not having vital cash tied up in stock for long periods

- not having stock going off / out of date

- not having to build and run massive warehousing to store said stock

But of course it relies on an efficient supply chain. If something goes wrong, the whole system falls over. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[floydraser]

My Volvo has a 68 litre tank. Diesel weighs around 840gms per litre. So I'll carry on letting it go below half and only filling up for long journeys. Half a tank weighs about 28.5 kgs. No point carrying that around and more just in case there's another problem with supply. It'll be different when I'm on holiday but no point otherwise, but then I work from home. There's a small impact on wear and tear, fuel economy and emissions but times that by millions of cars and there's an impact. Best if they keep the supply chain rigid.

Just in time operation is a way of dealing with the fact that we live on a small island where space is a premium and therefore expensive. As long as it operates for longer periods than it doesn't operate, it's effecient.

Check out Google Earth - junction 18 of the M1. Follow the A5 north to Hinckley and see how many huge distribution depots there are, and new ones going up all the time. This is where all your drivers are. Back in 1992 the driver's agency I worked for in Hinckley, rented houses for drivers to share; there were some from Hull and Wales as I remember. Nothing new under the sun.

[BroadAmbition]

Sunday just gone, Bro was queuing up for fuel at one of the local filling stations as he had to go to Sunderland Monday for work,

There was a BMW X5 in front of him, the driver managed to put in just 15 x Ltrs of fuel - That is panic buying to the extreme, those X5's must have proper large tanks, as if 15 x Ltrs is going to make any difference

Griff

[BroadAmbition]

Oh and I've just seen on one of our local FB groups, that someone is offering 30 x Ltrs of diesel in exchange for a doctors appointment

Griff

[BrundallNavy]

I managed to get petrol yesterday, only one car at the pump who was in the shop paying so a quick fill up ( I was on quarter full ) now at 3/4 so should last until this madness is over. They only had unleaded and Diesel was only for commercial vehicles.

[Meantime]

Seems like the press haven't quite done enough damage in causing people to panic and fill their cars up. Today's news coverage is all about fuel prices being at an all time high, the price of crude rising due to demand as the pandemic eases and how the price of fuel has gone up by another 1p over the weekend. So if we all rush out now we can prolong this disturbance and create even more havoc and save ourselves a few pennies in case the price rises by another 1p a litre this weekend!!!! 

[CeePee1952]

Everyone ready for the next "panic buying" fiasco??  Apparently, or should that be allegedly, there's an acute shortage of turkey pluckers this Christmas!!  I guess the media are waiting for the petrol "shortage" news to fade away before jumping on to the next "crisis" to promote their ratings!

Chris

[Mouldy]

1 minute ago, CeePee1952 said:

Everyone ready for the next "panic buying" fiasco??  Apparently, or should that be allegedly, there's an acute shortage of turkey pluckers this Christmas!!  I guess the media are waiting for the petrol "shortage" news to fade away before jumping on to the next "crisis" to promote their ratings!

Chris

As long as the shortage is of turkey pluckers and not pheasant pluckers.  We need more pheasant pluckers not less!! 😉😉😁