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Germany's A61 motorway - photo credits @ Wolkenkratzer, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons (image cropped)

Lorry bans in Germany in 2024. See the penalties for breaking them

A calendar of lorry bans for this year has been published by the Federal Office for Logistics and Mobility (BALM, formerly BAG) in Germany.

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BALM has published a list of public holidays on which driving bans will apply in 2024. We would like to remind readers that in Germany, lorries with a maximum authorised weight of more than 7.5 tonnes are subject to traffic restrictions on Sundays and public holidays from 0:00 to 22:00 throughout the year. 

According to this year’s schedule, the movement of the above-mentioned vehicles will be prohibited on the following dates:

Date Holiday Prohibited area
March 29 Good Friday All federal states of Germany
April 1st Easter Monday All federal states of Germany
1 May Labour Day All federal states of Germany
May 9 Ascension of the Lord All federal states of Germany
20th of May Pentecost All federal states of Germany
May 30 Corpus Christi Only in the states of Baden-Württemberg, Bavaria, Hesse, North Rhine-Westphalia, Rhineland-Palatinate and Saarland.
October 3 Unity Day All federal states of Germany
October 31st Reformation Day Only in the federal states of Brandenburg, Bremen, Hamburg, Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, Lower Saxony, Saxony, Saxony-Anhalt, Schleswig-Holstein and Thuringia.
November 1 All the saints Only in the states of Baden-Württemberg, Bavaria, North Rhine-Westphalia, Rhineland-Palatinate and Saarland.
25th of December Christmas All federal states of Germany
December 26 Christmas All federal states of Germany

Fines for breaking the ban

According to the so-called catalogue of fines for 2024, the following penalties will be imposed for violating traffic bans in Germany:

Offence Fine
Illegal driving on a Sunday or a public holiday (penalty for the driver) 120 euros
If the owner has ordered or permitted illegal driving on a Sunday or a public holiday (penalty for the owner / carrier of the vehicle) 570 euros
Violation of the Saturday traffic ban 25 euros
Saturday driving ban: if driving for more than 15 minutes during the banned hours 60 euros
Ban on driving on Saturdays for the owner/operator of the vehicle, if the driver drove the vehicle for more than 15 minutes during the prohibited hours. 150 euros

Restrictions do not apply to everyone

Some lorries are exempt from Germany’s Sunday and public holiday bans. These are vehicles that carry out

– combined road-rail transport from the consignor to the nearest loading station or from the nearest unloading station to the consignee, up to a maximum distance of 200 km;

– combined transport (port and road) between the place of loading or unloading and a port not more than 150 kilometres away (delivery and export);

– transport and related unladen journeys of the following goods: fresh milk and fresh milk products, fresh meat and fresh meat products, fresh fish, live fish and fresh fish products, perishable fruit and vegetables.

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