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A forthcoming book, which proposes banning daytime truck deliveries and cutting the number of big trucks in favour of smaller commercial vehicles has been dismissed as nonsense by haulage associations.

Green, User Friendly Transport, by retired Rover mechanical engineer Peter Mole, argues that a reduction in heavy trucks would increase the space available to light commercial and private traffic.

Mole says: "All that is required is for local councils to ban the use of the heavier  lorry in town centres until after shopping and business hours. This would leave operators with the option of either running night shifts or changing to the smaller vehicles during the daytime."

Mole sent a copy of his manuscript to Liberal Democrat MP for Kingston and Surbiton, Edward Davey, who says he finds Mole's proposals both comprehensive and interesting.

Hauliers representatives were less flattering. Roger King, chief executive of the Road Haulage Association(RHA), describes the ideas in the book as a joke. "The idea that more lorries will reduce congestion and pollution is laughable, and due to delivery restrictions, you can't send trucks into towns and cities at night. Customers want deliveries all through the day."

Geoff Dossetter, director of external affairs at the Freight Transport Association (FTA) agreed the ideas were nonsense, adding that the suggestion defies  the laws of economics.