Assesment of Dutch longer and heavier vehicles with a performance based approach and its applicability to Europe

Abstract

The volume of goods transported as well as the number of commercial vehicles in Europe has increased substantially over the past decade. The sixteen years old European directive on vehicle weights and dimensions does not fully reflect on these circumstances and allows commercial vehicles up to 18.75m of length and weight of 44t for international transport. As the Dutch experience reveals, the legalization of longer and heavier vehicles (LHV) on highways makes transportation of goods more efficient, sustainable and is applicable even in highly populated regions. This paper is benchmarking the performance of all currently used Dutch LHV combinations, two potential LHV concepts satisfying the logistic needs, and conventional European combinations using the Australian performance based approach. Furthermore it discusses applicability of performance based standards to Europe as an alternative to current prescriptive legislation and shows that performance of LHV’s can differ very much