34% drivers fined in sudden police drives

About every third driver was handed over a fine, summary penal fee or a caution during enhanced monitoring of heavy goods traffic last week.

The number increased slightly from last year's figures, said a press release issued by the police on Friday.

This time the enhanced monitoring was carried out without prior warning. According to Chief Superintendent Kari Onninen, this had an effect on the outcome: the number of overloads and number of cautions increased significantly.

On the other hand, consequences relating to vehicle condition were almost at the same level as a year ago. But this year there were 22 cases when the vehicle was not allowed to continue owing to a fault in it. The figure for 2016 was 14.

A total of 1,664 vehicles were checked during the drive, of which 1,232 were Finnish and 422 from abroad.

Compared with last year’s monitoring period, the number of foreign vehicles increased and that of Finnish ones decreased slightly.

About 33.5 per cent of the drivers were given a fine, summary penal fee or a caution. Some 183, or 11 per cent, of the drivers had driving and resting time infringements. Last year this figure was were 270, or 13.4 per cent.

“There are major differences between police departments in the number of infringements. In Eastern Uusimaa, for example, the number of driving and resting time infringements was almost triple than that of last year,” said Onninen.

The number of cautions increased from last year’s 115 to 219. Nearly 23 per cent of Finnish vehicles gave reason to a fine or summary penal fee, while the figure for foreign transports was 11.8 per cent.

However, the most significant increase according to Onninen was related to overloads, the number of which almost doubled. They went up from 27 last year to 52. The number of overloads increased especially in the police departments of Oulu, Eastern Finland, Inner Finland, and Ostrobothnia.

The police carried out enhanced heavy traffic monitoring in the entire country during the period 9–15 October.

Monitoring focused on driving and resting times, securing the load and condition of vehicles. So far during 2017, the police have inspected almost 7,000 heavy vehicles in similar monitoring periods, the press release added.