On Normalcy: The rest times of truck drivers in Europe

DVZ Landverkehr reports (article in German):

LKW-Fahrer dürfen ihre wöchentliche Ruhezeit nicht im Fahrzeug verbringen. Zu diesem Ergebnis kommt Generalanwalt Evgeni Tanchev in seinen Schlussanträgen vom 2. Februar vor dem Europäischen Gerichtshof (EuGH). Hintergrund ist die Klage des Transportunternehmens Vaditrans gegen den Belgischen Staat.

(“Truck drivers must not spend their weekly downtime within the vehicle. That’s the conclusion drawn by general attorney Evgeni Tanchev in his final plea of Feb, 2nd before the ECJ. Background is a complaint of Vaditrans vs. Belgium”)

Most European countries require that the weekly downtime of truck drivers must not be spent in the vehicle. Vaditrans sued against this rule and the penalties for violation. European law allows daily downtimes to be spent in the cabin, but says nothing about weekly downtimes. Local rules in many states require that the drivers must not spent them on the vehicle. The same proceedings are also reported in Eurotransport (article in German).

The comments below the article rage against the ruling, with many commenters asking how this could possibly be implemented or how the ruling is unfair, cost intensive and generally wrong.

The definition of what is normal apparently can be distorted quite heavily - normal for most people obviously would be that drivers to park their vehicles next to a motel and sleep in proper rooms and beds, with proper meals and sanitary installations, every day, because that’s how jobs work in a civilization. Instead, people rage against requiring that drivers can and should be doing this at least on their weekends, claiming this to be impossible and abnormal.