Awww, RUTS! Problems and Solutions with Overweight Trucks in West Central Minnesota

In late 1998, the West Central Minnesota Transportation Advisory Committee (TAC) held several meetings to identify and prioritize the goals and objectives for the regional transportation system. The issue of overloaded trucks was raised as an area of concern. While state highways are designed to handle heavy commercial traffic, overloaded and improperly loaded trucks can cause significant damage to city, county and township roads that aren’t designed to handle them. This increased damage shortens the life of roads, thereby forcing local communities to rebuild these roads on an accelerated schedule. It is difficult for communities to absorb the increased costs associated with the more frequent re-building of roads. Two related goal statements that were developed ranked highly in the prioritization: (1) “To encourage legislative reform in order to reduce or eliminate barriers to effective enforcement of weight restrictions on all highways.” (2) “To develop a district-wide pilot project to address overweight trucks.” To address the issues raised by these goal statements, the TAC formed a Truck Weight Sub-Committee (TWSC) in April of 1999. The TWSC was charged with researching the issue of truck weight damage to regional highways and developing potential solutions to the problem, with a focus on education, enforcement and engineering. The culmination of two years of research is contained within the TWSC Final Report, approved by the TAC in May of 2001. The TWSC Final Report was composed using input from the TAC, Mn/DOT, the Minnesota State Patrol, city and county law enforcement agencies, and commercial shipping companies. Results of the report focus on solutions concentrating on the “three E’s” of education, enforcement and engineering mentioned above, and call for further study on the subject by Mn/DOT and the Minnesota Department of Public Safety (DPS), which oversees the operations of the State Patrol. The Report also resulted in a proposal for a Pilot Project that would convert the Red River Weigh Station on Interstate 94 into a full service Motor Carrier Service Center.

• Corporate Authors:

  Transportation Research Board

  500 Fifth Street, NW
  Washington, DC  United States  20001
• Authors:
  • Hurley, Wayne T
• Conference:
  • Eighth National Conference on Transportation Planning for Small and Medium-Sized Communities
  • Location: Cincinnatti OH, United States
  • Date: 2002-9-18 to 2002-9-20
• Publication Date: 2002

Language

• English

Media Info

• Media Type: CD-ROM
• Pagination: 8p
• Monograph Title: Eighth National Conference on Transportation Planning for Small and Medium-Sized Communities, September 18-20, 2002, Cincinnati, Ohio

Subject/Index Terms

• TRT Terms: Education; Engineering; Highway maintenance; Interstate highways; Law enforcement; Motor carriers; Overweight loads; Pavement distress; Pavement performance; Regional transportation; Ruts (Pavements); Strategic planning; Transportation planning; Trucks; Weigh stations
• Candidate Terms: Service centers
• Geographic Terms: Minnesota
• Subject Areas: Highways; Motor Carriers; Planning and Forecasting; Security and Emergencies; Society; Terminals and Facilities; I10: Economics and Administration; I72: Traffic and Transport Planning;

Filing Info

• Accession Number: 01045176
• Record Type: Publication
• Files: TRIS, TRB
• Created Date: Mar 7 2007 4:24PM