At present, 13 countries of the European Union, including France, Italy, Belgium, Luxembourg and the UK, already allow 44 tons of cargo in freight transport vehicles at a national level, and the Spanish Government intends to introduce the same at the beginning of next year.
The aim of the European Commission is to promote a modification of the current European Directive on weights and dimensions of transport vehicles to harmonize national regulations, facilitate cross-border transport and contribute to energy efficiency and emission reduction.
The European Commission admits that there is currently a real fragmentation of the market for the use of large and overweight vehicles due to the mosaic of national and bilateral or multilateral rules on maximum weights and dimensions.
For this reason, the Commission proposes to automatically authorize the cross-border transport of heavier or longer vehicles between all the neighbouring Member States that allow it and to harmonize the maximum weights and dimensions with the most common limits currently allowed, through the additional weight of up to 44 tons.
The processing and approval of the new European Directive would take at least 2 years, Fenadsimer adds.