General
Many countries define truck routes where dedicated vehicles or vehicles with particular loads must follow. Examples for such vehicles are trucks with hazardous goods or long trucks. But there are also routes where vehicles should use them, but it is not an obligation. These routes are recommendations by authorities or organizations. One reason for such a route could be to avoid trucks in city centers. In general, the designated truck routes ensure road safety, protect infrastructure and maintain efficient traffic flow.
Examples for truck route traffic signs
Routing API
In the Routing API you have the possibility to consider the truck routes in the route calculation. With the request parameter truckRoutes in the method calculateRoute you can specify a comma-separated list of truck routes the vehicle has to follow. The first two letters of the available values in the type TruckRoutes denote the country abbreviation to get a quick country overview (for example NL_LZV for long trucks in the Netherlands). Then the specified truck routes get a bonus in the route calculation and are probably used from trucks that pass nearby.
It is also possible to consider the parameter truckRoutes at waypoints in the method calculateRoutePost. This is useful in case of changes at the waypoint (for example loading or unloading hazardous goods).
Limitations
Please note that there is no guarantee to use truck routes and the route is not marked as violated, if for example the detour to reach them is too big. Moreover, the parameter truckRoutes is ignored for non-truck profiles like car or van and it only works for the routing mode FAST.