maybe it
>> is only suitable around towns and not on motorways.
>>
Nail pretty much hit on head. Ideal for an urban environment where there's a lot of stop-start work; bus-type entry door so the crew can get on and off without climbing down, also solves ventilation problem on hot days. Note also that the cab on dustcarts is positioned well forwards, again taken from bus design. This gives excellent manouverability but at the expense of ride comfort at speed and also causes problems with diminishing payload as would be the case on an urban multi-drop lorry; effectively you end up with too much weight on the front axle. Dustcarts are full of machinery inside the body which alleviates this.
These dustcarts are of course designed to optimise the driver's view not only of his immediate environs, but most importantly of his colleagues working behind him.
There have been many purpose-built urban delivery vehicles designed over the years, some more successful than others. You should not underestimate the amount of money which both chassis and body designers put into this either. Unfortunately nobody has as yet come up with a one size fits all solution, although I could easily suggest one.
Redesign the towns to accomodate the lorries. ;-)
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