Malmesbury residents say lorries damage buildings and ignore 7.5 tonne limit
Residents and business owners in Malmesbury say HGVs are hitting buildings, knocking down fences and ignoring the town's 7.5 tonne weight limit, with the mayor highlighting Operation Snap reporting.
The Full Story
A plain summary built from the channels that reported this story.
Residents and business owners in Malmesbury say outsized lorries are causing chaos in the historic town centre. They report HGVs hitting buildings multiple times, knocking down fences and getting stuck while trying to turn corners in narrow streets. The situation is described as increasingly dangerous, with some drivers said to ignore the 7.5 tonne weight limit.
The problems are not new. For several years, lorries have been thundering through the town centre. A travel agent in the town has been hit twice by HGVs, and lorries have also become stuck trying to negotiate the narrow streets.
Mayor Robert Hastings said the town council receives reports on a weekly basis, which is too much at the moment. He pointed people to Operation Snap as the official way to record incidents. The scheme was set up by West Midlands Police and is now operated by Wiltshire Council and Wiltshire Police. It allows people to record HGVs going through town centres with weight limits such as Malmesbury. People can report directly or send footage to the town council, which has CCTV, to show that an HGV was not making a registered delivery.
Safety and traffic. The mayor said the narrow roads and pavements meant lorries could "quite easily wipe out pedestrians and anything". He said the town centre was becoming a concern. When lorries had to reverse, he added, it caused gridlock. Malmesbury already had enough trouble with parking, and reversing lorries added more chaos.
Wiltshire Council said a 7.5 tonne weight limit was already in place in Malmesbury, but that the problem was it was being ignored. The reports from residents, businesses and the town council point to a continuing problem with enforcement and compliance rather than a lack of restrictions.
On screen
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Key Claims
Claims reported during this story's coverage, grouped by how many channels reported each one. Select a dot to see the source excerpt.
| Claim |  |
|---|---|
| Only on one channel | |
| Residents and businesses in Malmesbury reported that HGVs were hitting buildings, knocking down fences and getting stuck, including a town-centre travel agent hit twice. | |
| Wiltshire Council said a 7.5 tonne weight limit was already in place in Malmesbury but was being ignored. | |
Channel Perspectives
What each channel focused on, with key quotes.
BBC ONE West led its lunchtime bulletin on the lorry problems in Malmesbury, using an on-location report and an interview with the mayor. It focused on the practical impact on residents and businesses, including repeated building strikes and gridlock, and explained how Operation Snap can be used to report weight-limit breaches. The tone was sympathetic to the town and framed the issue as an ongoing enforcement problem rather than a one-off incident.
- “residents and business owners in Malmesbury say lorries are causing pandemonium in their historic town, hitting buildings multiple times and knocking down fences.”
- “The travel agents behind me has been hit twice by HGVs and lorries have also got stuck trying to turn the corners through these narrow streets.”
- “Wiltshire Council told us there is a 7.5 tonne weight limit already in place here in Malmesbury, but the problem is it's just being ignored.”
Who was on air
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- 13:38 BST
Broadcast Timeline
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