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Most states require vehicles—especially trucks—to be under a certain weight limit when driving on public roadways. These roads generally apply to highways and bridges but can also apply to your run-of-the-mill side streets and avenues. This article will break down overweight truck violations for you so you can understand the law and learn how to avoid these tickets.

Why Are There Overweight Laws?

The main reasons why local and state governments pass overweight vehicle laws are to preserve the condition of public roadways and protect other drivers. If a vehicle is too heavy for a bridge, highway overpass, or other roadway, the vehicle’s wheels (and other parts) can cause significant damage to the pavement.

If a road is particularly winding or marked by features that reduce visibility, that road might also have laws restricting weight loads. That’s because, according to physics experts, heavier vehicles have much longer brake distances. On this kind of road, that leaves large trucks with virtually no time to react to hazards, increasing the chances of getting into an accident. 

What Are the Risks Associated With Overweight Trucks?

Overweight trucks open other drivers and the roadways themselves to a long list of dangers. Among those dangers are the following potential hazards: 

• Overheated or blown-out tires
• Overheated or failed brakes
• Extended stopping distances
• Tipping over when rounding a corner or driving during high winds
• Reduced brake efficiency due to weight shifting
• Accelerated deterioration of roadway surfaces and damage to bridges

If a tire blows out on a compact car, the damage of the wheel impacting and scraping along the pavement will be minimal. However, if a tire blows out on an 81,000-pound vehicle, that wheel can tear the pavement to shreds as the vehicle grinds to a stop. That kind of damage can then create a roadway hazard to other drivers, whose tires might be damaged as a result of the worsened condition of the roadway.

How To Measure if a Truck Is Overweight?

Measuring an overweight truck can be quite the challenge. Generally, the only way to weigh a large truck is to drive through an official weigh station and allow the station’s staff to put their devices to work. In some cases, local governments have begun using “weight-in-motion” scales, which provide individual axle, axle group, and gross vehicle weight ratings (GVWRs) for each vehicle weighed.

It is unlikely that you will be pulled over by a police officer who visually estimated the weight of your vehicle to be above the permissible limit. That’s because most police departments do not have any technology that enables them to gain an accurate picture of a large vehicle’s total GVWR.

The Laws

Each state has their own vehicle and traffic laws. In some cases, those laws can even vary from one county to another, with two counties right next door to one another having entirely different laws on the matter. In order to know what the laws are in your particular neck of the woods, download the WinIt app and contact a lawyer today.

How To Avoid Fines Overweight Trucking Fines

The best way to avoid fines for an overweight trucking ticket is to not take on any loads that will put you over the limit. However, that’s not always an easy thing to keep track of. With modern shipping and logistics technology, like machine learning and artificial intelligence, it’s become more possible every day.

Today, the fact is that very few truckers find themselves in the employ of a company that has access to such cutting-edge technologies. For those truckers and their companies, the following tips should do the trick:

Train Drivers To Calculate Weight

Training drivers to calculate weight can help ensure that they have an accurate understanding of their vehicle’s GVWR prior to getting on the road. For example, if their vehicle is 20,000 pounds and the weight of the trailer they’re picking up is 45,000 pounds, they’ll know to add those numbers up to 65,000 pounds.

From there, it becomes a matter of dividing that weight by the number of axles and the number of the wheels to determine those two metrics. Of course, having a trained shipping logistics analyst or supply chain engineer perform these calculations on the trucker’s behalf can save a great deal more time and money for larger companies who can afford such staffing expenses.

Keep Trucks and Equipment Well-Maintained

Poorly maintained equipment becomes hard-to-maintain equipment and then the cycle worsens over time. The worse condition you keep your equipment in, the more likely it is that you’ll experience at least one of the following consequences:

• Your truck breaks down and you’re out of work while it’s in the shop.
• You get a ticket for faulty equipment.
• You cause a serious accident, the court finds you at fault, and you lose your commercial driver license (CDL).

Plan the Route in Advance

Knowledge is power. When you know the maximum weight laws along your route, you can plot a course that avoids the places where your vehicle cannot legally be on the road. For example, if you’re driving a 40,000-pound truck, you’ll want to find a different route than the one that crosses a bridge with a maximum weight limit of 30,000 pounds.

Secure the Load and Make Sure It Is Properly Loaded

Unsecured loads can shift while you drive, improperly redistributing the weight in such a way that puts you in violation of the per-axle weight restrictions of your state. This can result in serious financial penalties even when your vehicle is below the maximum GVWR. You can even get another ticket for having an unsecured load in addition to the ticket for driving an overweight vehicle.

Have Information on Overweight Permits Ready

Many times, truckers can pay a good chunk of cash for the government to grant them an overweight trucking permit. These permits can cost hundreds of dollars or a couple grand, depending on where you are. But that’s still much, much less than the several-hundred-thousand-dollar fine that your business could face for violating a state’s maximum weight restriction.

Failure to display these permits when asked can result in them not being considered by the ticketing officer. If you have such a permit for a vehicle, it is absolutely crucial that you keep it up-to-date and have it on-hand at all times without exception.

Oversize and Overweight Fines and Penalties by State

In most cases, the fine for an overweight vehicle violation is only a couple hundred dollars. However, places like Rhode Island can fine a company hundreds of thousands of dollars if the right conditions are met. To find out just how much the actual ticket will cost you, click here.