Channel 5 Online (UK), July 9, 2001

With roads becoming ever more congested, and traffic in our cities coming to a virtual standstill, the rewards for delivering packages quickly can be very high. For when time is money, anyone who can beat the clock can earn big bucks.

The impression given by this programme is that concepts such as courtesy, road etiquette, red lights and motoring laws in general are as outdated as the road system itself, which in many cities was constructed in the 17th century.

According to psychologist Conrad King, “it’s bedlam, a lunatic asylum, and courier drivers have managed to remove their straitjackets.” We meet some of the larger-than-life characters who risk their lives (and ours) every time they get behind the wheel or on the saddle.

Womble is a veteran motorcycle courier, who, since 1984 has “delivered everything you can think of… I delivered a kidney once!” Special cameras give us the courier’s eye view as they squeeze their vehicles through the smallest of gaps.

Particularly impressive is Jason Chalmers, a bicycle courier who will jump lights, ride on the pavement, and would probably run over his own granny to get his parcels delivered on time. Astonishingly, we hear that on average, a bicycle courier rides 580 miles per week… so perhaps it’s little wonder that they appear to think they own the roads.

The programme also talks to a ‘white van woman’, a milkman, cabbies, and Ray Doyle, who drives a Heavy Goods Cycle Vehicle, which can carry the load of a small van, yet has the manoeuvrability of a bike, in what proves to be a high-speed half hour.