As Truck and lorry drivers fail to abide by the law in loading their vehicles The Ministry of Construction’s Seminar  on Truck Overloading [Archives:1999/11/Local News]

Overloading trucks is one of the main problems effecting our roads. This practice causes the reduction of the estimated life span of these roads. In addition to that it also spoils and damages the vehicles.
Realizing the importance of this issue, the Ministry of Constructions, Housing and Urban Planing in collaboration with the Roads Maintenance Fund(RMF), organized the first national conference, on Tuesday 9th March 1999. to inform people on the negative effects of overloading.
One of the conference aims, was to throw light on the republican decree #23 for 1994. for weight and dimensions for conveyor vehicles.
The law aims to protect the roads from overloading. It also introduces the different weight categories, and their implications. To control and regulate overloading, in order to reduce the risks and damage to the roads and vehicles. Finally, it attempts to regulate the import of vehicles to Yemen.
The conference’s concluding Communiqus were as follows:
The conference has reached the following recommendations as a basis to regulate and implement laws for this sector.
1. The establishment of central and mobilized weight stations, in order to cover all the entrances to the cities, ports and airports, within the period of three years. And to staff and use the existing stations.
2. The ministry of construction, in collaboration with the ministry of transport, the ministry of interior and the ministry of commerce, must take the necessary measurements to ensure full compliance of trucks drivers with the Yemeni specifications and standards.
3. The ministry should have supervisory power over the RMF, while the RMF is to supervise the weight stations.
4. In view of the different laws applied to weight and trucks’ dimensions from one country to another and to ease transport procedures, it is recommended to take the appropriate measures through the Arab League to unify these laws and regulations.
5. The establishment of proper statistics methods- recording the number of incoming and outgoing trucks, weights etc.- for the reference of the Republic.
6. Customs officers and other concerned authorities must check the technical specifications of these trucks, and block the entrance of those violating the technical specifications.
7. Organizing campaigns to educate the owners and drivers on the damages caused by overloading.
8. The establishment of a fair tariff for all concerned parties: merchants, owners and citizens.
9. Dues for the damages caused by trucks – loaded or not- and to unify road tax for all vehicles. The RMF is to formulate a layout, as to how to collect these taxes.
10. To set up a follow-up committee to ensure the implication of these recommendations.
By- Hatem Bamehriz
Yemen Times.

——
[archive-e:11-v:1999-y:1999-d:1999-03-15-p:./1999/iss11/ln.htm]