Truckie rates roads poorly

Mr Lockhart works for Gilbert's Transport Queensland, based in Toowoomba, and has been driving B-double trucks along the east coast for the past 30 years.

He said many of the roads were in a poor state and where roadworks had been carried out, the needs of heavy vehicles had not been considered.

Mr Lockhart agreed with some of the points raised in the National Road Asset Reporting Pilot, a report released this week by Infrastructure Australia.

A key finding is 26 per cent of roads in rural Australia are predicted to be impassable after 20mm of rain.

"Rain does make some jobs and roads impassable - I'm not saying a shower of rain will stop you, but a deluge could," he said.

"The Gore Highway is a particularly bad highway for it. When it floods it becomes a dangerous road between Captains Mountain and Goondiwindi."

Mr Lockhart said more maintenance on waterways would in turn help to improve road conditions in wet weather.

"In my opinion they need to clean all the waterways and drains so that water can get away; they need to clean under bridges so water can get away instead of sitting and laying around.

"Once that water builds up, where does it go? It goes over the road because it can't get away.

"If you don't keep your gutters clean at home and get a heavy downpour of rain they overflow - so you have to clean them out."

Over the past year roadworks have been carried out on stretches of the Warrego Highway between Jondaryan and Dalby, and Wallumbilla and Roma.

However, Mr Lockhart said the design of the new roads made it dangerous for heavy vehicles to pull over.

"If you have a breakdown or a flat tyre, you can't get off the road safely because they have built the road up so high and increased the camber.

"If half of your vehicle is still in the carriage way, it becomes a very dangerous path. There are not enough parking bays along the highway for drivers to pull over and change tyres or carry out repairs."