America’s roads are in rough shape. Across the country, policymakers are grappling with surging road maintenance costs and expenses along with rising casualties and costs due to traffic accidents. According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, fatal and serious car accidents impose $2 trillion in societal costs per year, or about $15,000 per American household. Infrastructure repair will cost taxpayers an astounding $2.6 trillion over the next ten years.
As the Taxpayers Protection Alliance (TPA) details in its latest brief, transportation costs would be higher if the federal government allowed bigger trucks on our roads. In the previous Congress, lawmakers pushed to unravel the transportation system by introducing bills such as H.R. 3372 and H.R. 2948 that proposed to increase the number of oversized trucks on highways across the country. These costly proposals are all but certain to be reintroduced in the 119th Congress. Lawmakers should avoid these policy pitfalls and potholes and put common sense back in the driver’s seat.
The reality is that different states have different rules on what’s allowed on our roads. While the federal government mandates a 80,000-pound weight cap on trucks on interstates, states have systems that allow vehicles way above this limit access to certain designated roads — often contingent on payment of fees. A joint 2024 study by the Indiana Department of Transportation and Purdue University underscores the disparity in state regulations on truck size and weight systems. For example, “Indiana and Wisconsin [have] the highest thresholds for extra-legal truck weights (over 200,000 lbs. and 170,000 lbs., respectively). They are followed by Missouri (160,000 lbs.), Iowa (156,000 lbs.), Michigan (150,000 lbs.), Minnesota (145,000 lbs.), and Ohio, Illinois, and Kentucky (120,000 lbs.).”
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In other words, Indiana allows trucks that weigh as much as 120,000 pounds over the federal cap/limit to drive on their roads provided that they pay sufficient fees in return to offset the wear-and-tear the oversized trucks have on the roads. Meanwhile, states such as Ohio, Illinois, and Kentucky only allow fee-paying trucks 40,000 pounds above the federal limit. Fee structures range from simple flat fees (e.g., Michigan) to more complex weight-distance combinations (e.g., Illinois and Indiana).
While this federalist-based system brings in increased revenues from overweight vehicles (OWs) in recent years, greater issuance of OW permits leads to more wear-and-tear and required maintenance usually paid for by taxpayers. The Indiana Department of Transportation and Purdue University conclude, “routes that experience higher cumulative loads see their PCR [Pavement Condition Rating] decrease faster than their counterparts ... [OW] routes with higher cumulative loads experience on average approximately 70,000 more ESALs [Equivalent Single Axle Load] than their counterparts and see PCR drops of six points on average ... this translates into approximately $3,778/mile in pavement damage cost due to OW operations.”
Wear-and-tear is not the only issue posed by these larger-than-life big-rigs. According to the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, “Multiple-trailer trucks have more handling problems than single-trailer trucks. In general, the additional connection points contribute to greater instability, which can lead to jackknifing, overturning, and lane encroachments.” There’s a clear link between oversized and vehicle damage, with a 9 ton big rig inflicting 40 times the amount of damage as a Hummer H2.
Even if putting large trucks on the road could led to fewer trucks total in operation, the road space would just be taken up by new traffic. According to a 2009 analysis by the University of Pennsylvania and the University of Toronto scholars, an increase in road capacity by 10 percent will increase traffic by 10 percent. In other words, more vehicles are “induced” onto the roads whenever trucking fleets consolidate so bigger isn’t always better. The “open roads” will be as clogged as ever, but with increased safety and infrastructure costs caused by more mammoth trucks.
Yet, proposed federal laws such as the CARS Act would only exacerbate these issues. By increasing federal weight limits, this bill could prevent states like Indiana from enforcing their own road standards and undermine state-based solutions that seek to balance user-based fees with and taxpayer cost-sharing. These bills could push even more costs onto federal and state taxpayers and only benefit a select few.
Instead of pushing for more oversized trucks, federal lawmakers should maintain and preserve current truck weight limits and allow states the flexibility and freedom to craft transportation systems around a default rule. Taxpayers and drivers deserve sensible roadworthiness rules that pump the breaks on increasing costs and safety concerns. This approach would ensure a more efficient, cost-effective, and safer transportation system — one that puts taxpayers and safety first.
Ross Marchand is a senior fellow at the Taxpayers Protection Alliance.
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