Melbourne to Sydney High Speed Train

Ever since seeing the Tyco Super Turbo Train commercial as a child, I have been dying for a High Speed Rail Network linking Australian Capital Cities.

Furthermore after admiring the speed & efficiency of the ICE train around Germany, I have become a complete advocate of the proposed Melbourne to Sydney High Speed Link.

February 2010 I attended UFC 110 at Acer Arena Sydney Olympic Park, having traveled from Geelong Victoria, The round trip involved a 3am wake up call, and arrival home just after midnight, in other words an immensely long & tiring day for a 2.5 hour event.

The reasoning behind this was the available flight times & required Check in periods prior to and fro. The Interlinking public transport from home to Airport, Airport to Venue and so on...

Initial thoughts that passengers could fork out less than $100 per ticket, travel at +350kph and arrive in less than 3 hours blows my mind!

Yes this would be one hell of a expensive logistical challenge given the recent fall in our economy, but I feel the benefits alone should be merit to push this through parliament as soon as possible, and get the construction ball rolling.

(September 12. 2006). Tyco Super Turbo Train w/ Daredevil Jump. [online]Youtube; courtesy of user: panbiscuit. Available from: SOURCE [Accessed 25 Sep 2011].

The Secret of calculating Air freight cost

If your company is airfreighting quiet often and using an air freight forwarder, you should have received a rate sheet, usually split into regions.

Generally speaking each region will have four methods of calculating the total charge, maybe a fifth or sixth for a country or airport with additional handling or customs requirements.

An airfreight charge per kilogram, war/fuel surcharge, fixed local charge per shipment and variable local charge per kilogram will typically be the basis for calculating the cost of freight. Additional factors may come into play including origin terminal handling charges or document fees.

Information the freight forwarder will require to quote the shipment composes of the outer carton CBM (Carton dimensions - L x W x H), Volumetric Weight (Outer Carton CBM x 167), Gross Weight of Carton & the number of cartons.

The greater of the Volumetric Weight and the Gross Weight will equal the chargeable weight which will then be plugged into the freight forwarders rate sheet.

For further detail, e.g. calculating the freight per unit cost if say you were shipping 100 units per carton, a units per carton column can be added into the formula.

Click to Download the excel spreadsheet I use to calculate airfreight cost on a day-to-day basis.