50mph truck speed limit looms closer
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• A Brussels-imposed 80km/h (50mph) speed limit for trucks on Britain's motorways has moved closer.
Members of the European Parliament now look certain to support Commission plans to harmonise HGV speed limits throughout the Community.
MEPs voted earlier this month to accept draft regulations setting tighter restrictions on diesel exhaust emissions — rules which EC Commissioner Vasso Papandreou says will create EC standards as tough as those in the US. The proposals aim to reduce gaseous pollutants — carbon dioxide, hydrocarbons and nitrogen oxide — and particulates from 1 July 1992, with stricter limits coming into force from 1995.
But the Freight Transport Association and Road Haulage Association are both anxious that lower speed limits should not be introduced as part of pollution-controlling measures (CM 8-14 Aug).
The FTA says that growing pressure for lowering speed limits throughout Europe would lead to more traffic on alternative, less safe routes; do away with many of the benefits of motorways over dual carriageways and other A-roads for trucks; create a motorway differential of 32km/h (20mph) between HGVs and cars or coaches, adding to accidents; cost the road transport industry £500m; and erode the "significant increase in lorry productivity achieved over recent years".