Mr. Snauwaert said it was up to local communities to make it clear what roads were not appropriate for trucks, and to install signs saying so. The relevant information, including things like height, width and weight constraints, could then eventually be integrated into the databases used for G.P.S. devices, he said.

It may take months, if not years, to make the next step: manufacturing G.P.S. devices for trucks — or lorries, as they call them here — that take into account the more sophisticated information. But local governments are working to compile the data.

Image A driver tried to reverse course after his way was blocked by another truck. Credit... Danfung Dennis for The New York Times

“If we can get the right information, then we can start re-routing the lorries,” said Richard Matthews, the senior transport planner for Somerset County Council, which is taking the lead in pushing for a countrywide approach. In a survey of local governments, Somerset found that 82 percent of communities had experienced G.P.S.-related traffic problems.

“I’ve just come from a community today where a lorry had literally lifted the roof off a house as it tried to get past,” Mr. Matthews said.

Some communities have begun putting up signs warning drivers to ignore their G.P.S. devices on rural roads. But signs seem to be less and less effective as people increasingly rely more on G.P.S. systems and less on maps, common sense or their own eyes.

“We’ve heard some very hilarious stories where people just blindly follow the sat nav instructions,” said Vince Yearley, a spokesman for the Institute of Advanced Motorists, using British shorthand for “satellite navigation.” “Like if the sat nav says, ‘Drive into this muddy field,’ they think, ‘That’s weird,’ but they do it anyway.”