As is the case with all goods, hazardous goods are spending more time on the EU's roads and less time in warehouses or factories. However, EU legislation on the transport of hazardous goods by road has a worrying weak point: parking areas.

Such areas and the goods parked on them may suffer the same fate as did the town of SEVESO. There are very few secure public parking areas for vehicles transporting hazardous substances. Generally speaking the existing parking areas are either inadequate in number or too restricted in capacity to allow vehicles to be parked under genuinely safe conditions. In the event of an accident in such areas the emergency action plans are patchy in the extreme, on account of a shortage of information concerning the nature of the hazardous substances parked there and the ways in which they may interact.

In what way does the Commission intend to tighten up and enforce Community law on the parking of road vehicles used for transporting hazardous goods?