KUALA TERENGGANU: To smoothen enforcement and operations, the Road Transport Department has beefed itself with an additional 35 heavy vehicles for its east coast region.
RTD deputy director-general Datuk Arifin Che Mat said the vehicles comprised Honda CRV, Ford Ranger and Ford Transit models for the states of Kelantan, Terengganu and Pahang.
He said both Kelantan and Terengganu received a mixer of 10 such vehicles each, while Pahang was given 15 in view of its larger terrain. The RTD has disbursed a total of 165 new heavy vehicles to other states.
"The new vehicles will also assist our officers in carrying out enforcement duties to curb accidents along hot spots, especially along the East Coast Highway 2 9LPT2) which is accident prone.
"We need the new vehicles as 302 of our four-wheel drives nationwide are near-obsolete and require regular heavy maintenance which is costing the department a lot of money," he said after handing over the vehicles to the three east coast state representatives at the Terengganu RTD office in Jalan Kemajuan Bukit Kecil.
Present was Terengganu RTD director Abdul Rahman Emang Anyie.
Arifin said that the depatment was spending about RM20,000 a year to maintain the old vehicles since 2004.
"Once more new vehicles are purchased, we will either scrap the old ones or use them as spares," he said.