Rigged for a Collision Course

Many states defy Washington by closing roads to monster trucks

When Congress last December passed the 5-c--per-gal. increase in the gasoline tax, designed to patch the nation's pothole-pocked highway system, it made a deal with the trucking industry. In addition to having to pay more at the pump beginning April 1, truckers found their highway-use taxes and registration fees raised, as of July 1984, from $240 a year to $1,600 for the largest rigs. As a palliative, Congress created rules to permit tandem-trailer trucks, some of them 40 tons in weight when loaded, unprecedented access to the interstate highway system and most of the nation's 260,000 miles of "primary" federally aided roads.

The provision, which went into effect last week, put the U.S. Government and a handful of states on a collision course. The state legislature of Connecticut, which has outlawed tandem trailers on all roads since 1949, voted to continue its ban, thus becoming the first state to defy the new law. New Jersey's Governor Thomas Kean is sued an order limiting the giant rigs to interstate highways and two other major roads and proscribing them from roads the new federal law had opened up. By week's end Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, Vermont, Virginia and South Carolina pointedly announced that state troopers would continue to ticket truckers using tandem trailers, at least on certain highways.

The new federal legislation spelled out the first uniform, national standards for truck weights and measurements. It allows trucks up to 80,000 Ibs. in weight, 102 in. wide and 56 ft. long (plus the cab) to operate the full length of the 42,268-mile interstate system. The law also requires each state to designate other highways that could handle these loads.

The response from the states varied from cooperation to defiance. Some opened all their primary roads, others agreed to give the big rigs right-of-way over 50% or more of these highways. But the Federal Government was not taking no for an answer; when some states balked, the Department of Transportation as an interim measure added about 38,000 miles of road to the 101,000 miles the states had stipulated. If the states still refuse to comply, they could lose their federal highway funds.

Some recalcitrant states, in reply, charged that DOT was sloppy in selecting the routes for the interim list. According to the New Jersey transportation department, DOT opened to 40-ton trucks a portion of Route 9 in the state that includes a bridge currently posted with a twelve-ton weight limit. The designations will also permit bigger trucks to rumble through the traffic-clogged streets of New York City, Philadelphia, Trenton and other metropolitan areas on their way to delivery terminals.

Regardless of the size of the road, the rigs themselves may pose a safety hazard: critics say they are harder to control and more prone to jackknife than smaller trucks. Truck drivers assert, however, that tandem trailers, known in the industry as "double bottoms," are safer than smaller rigs because they have extra axles and better weight distribution. But there is little question that the larger rigs will batter the nation's interstate highway system, initiated in 1956 for trucks far less hefty than today's.

At week's end a U.S. district court in Georgia, in response to a suit brought by the state, issued a temporary restraining order that banned the big rigs from about half of the routes opened by DOT. Vermont also threatened to sue. Most states, insisted DOT officials, were complying with the new policy. All the same, DOT was conferring with the Justice Department about legal action against the defiant states. This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so viewer discretion is required.