Transport - Transfers on HGV's

[puternut]

I have seen a number of cross-EU lorrries in the UK with green circular stickers on the bumpers or on the front lower panelling with large white letter 'H' or 'L' on them.
What do they signify please

[sddsddean]

They are stickers that have to be carried by trucks using Austrian roads. They are either white letters on green circles or black letters on yellow circles, but to be honest, I don't know what most of them are for! The only one I know (as I had it on my truck) is the white L on green background. The L stands for 'Larmarmshutze' (or something like that!!). The Austrians have strict regulations on emissions and noise as they are used as a land bridge between Germany/France etc and Italy/Balkans etc and they don't like it! The L sticker shows that your vehicle meets the noise regulations (encapsulated engine, air brake silencers etc), so you can travel at night. If you don't have this, you are not allowed to travel between 9pm and 6am (I think). Even with it, there are some stretches of motorway that you are restricted to 50kph during the night (though not many trucks, me included, used to take any notice of that bit!).

[kempie]

Further insight on ECMT "green" stickers and Austrian & German "low noise" stickers here...

http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=9AdsevXMHhM C&pg=RA1-PA622