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The bell SMA Road Safety has designed an innovative device, «Atlas», which weighs trucks on the road. The new system has just been previewed at Intertraffic Amsterdam, an important international event dedicated to road safety, smart mobility, infrastructure and traffic management, which has just ended. The system allows you to detect the weight while the vehicles are moving, promptly identifying overloaded vehicles, recording their license plate and sending an alert to the road manager who will notify the police. Atlas uses the latest generation wim (weigh in motion) technology which allows the control of vehicles even at high speed and revolutionizes the methods of monitoring heavy traffic, compared to traditional static weighing, which often causes slowdowns and does not allow real-time measurement.
30% of the vehicles in circulation are not in order
The European Truck & Bus campaign promoted by Roadpol, the network of European traffic police forces, has made it possible to carefully monitor the quality of heavy traffic on roads throughout Europe. From the surveys carried out at the end of 2023, it emerged that over 30% of the heavy vehicles subjected to inspection were not in compliance: out of 245,500 trucks checked, 79,152 infringements were detected. Among the most frequent sanctions: exceeding the permitted driving times, without respecting the mandatory breaks, excess load compared to the limit or incorrect fastening of the same. Violations that have a serious impact on road safety and the infrastructure itself.
«A truck that exceeds the weight permitted by current legislation represents a potential threat, because in the event of impact against a longitudinal barrier, it may not be adequately redirected, breaking it and causing serious damage to other vehicles in circulation, even falling from an overpass. An excess load also makes the braking system of the vehicle itself less efficient”, explains Roberto Impero, CEO of SMA Road Safety.
Sma specializes in road barriers
Sma is an excellence from Campania that has been investing in research and innovation for over a decade to develop life-saving solutions dedicated to passive road and infrastructure safety. After designing innovative emergency gates, crash attenuators, smart side barriers and traffic monitoring systems, the Campania company has turned towards dynamic weighing systems. «The deteriorated concrete of many bridges and viaducts, which has hit the news in recent years, has highlighted the issue of the danger of overloading road infrastructures – comments Impero again -. For this reason we considered it useful to invest in a product that was complementary to passive road safety, precisely because it concerns the monitoring and protection of the infrastructures themselves. The optimum is achieved by installing Atlas at toll booths, to stop the vehicle before it even enters the motorway – continues Impero -. In practice Atlas is like a tutor, but instead of measuring the speed, it weighs the vehicle when it passes with the wheels over special plates installed on the asphalt.”
In Italy there is a strong presence of bridges
Italy, it should not be forgotten, is the European country with the highest number of bridges on its motorway network, equal to 14% of the total km (the European average is 2.6%) and is also the oldest network in the continent, turns 100 in 2024. A system for protecting the road infrastructure is therefore crucial.