One government study has suggested that the passage of a 40 tonne vehicle has the same damage effect on a structure as 9,000 cars.

Bridge assets deteriorate over their lifetime from the effects of age and passage of traffic. Although overloading bridges in excess of their design or assessed capacity rarely causes collapse or even visible damage, it severely reduces their useful life and increases the requirements for costly bridge maintenance and eventually replacement.

Because each abnormal load vehicle has differing axle configurations, and bridges have different span and articulation arrangements, checking a proposed movement cannot ever be a simple process if it is both to protect the bridge and maximise availability of the national and local road network to hauliers.

Unhappily, budget and staffing constraints within local authorities often mean abnormal load notifications are overlooked or not checked and responded to within the prescribed two or five day notice period. Furthermore, if the structure owner doesn’t respond within the notice period, the haulier is free to move, and the damage done.

In the short term, checking abnormal load notifications is a non-revenue earning process for bridge owners. In the longer term, the requirement to check the movement of heavy loads over bridges is a priority to reduce ongoing maintenance costs and minimise bridge closures along our road network. AbLoads provides bridge owners with a low cost, safe, secure and very fast checking process without taking up valuable structural engineering resources.