North/West passage corridor-wide commercial vehicle permitting.

PDFTech ReportCFIRE 03-09T002688Freight trafficHighway capacityPermitsOversize loadsOverweight loadsRegional transportationCommercial vehiclesHighway corridorsInterstate compactsUnited StatesMinnesota. Dept. of TransportationWittwer, ErnieGollnik, RobertNational Center for Freight and Infrastructure Research and Education (U.S.)United States. Dept. of Transportation. Research and Innovative Technology AdministrationNTL-FREIGHT-FREIGHTNTL-FREIGHT-Trucking IndustryNTL-HIGHWAY/ROAD TRANSPORTATION-HIGHWAY/ROAD TRANSPORTATIONNTL-PLANNING AND POLICY-Planning - NewslettersUS Transportation CollectionThe efficient movement of freight is a key to the economic success of any state, region, or nation. Rising transport costs will tend tomake products from the region more expensive and less competitive in the national and global markets. This trend can be addressed byadding capacity, a very expensive and long-term solution; improving the management of the highway and rail systems; and by easingthe regulatory burden on carriers.Some states have organized themselves into compacts or coalitions to issue permits for these routine loads on a regional basis. Whilepermitting is one of the issues often raised by truckers as a costly and frustrating process, a number of concerns over exactly howindividual state rules can be harmonized to facilitate regional permitting must be resolved before multi-state agreements can be put intoplace. To better understand the nature of regional permitting processes, existing compacts or agreements must be reviewed and theirrules, processes, and administrative procedures documented. In addition, members of those compacts must be interviewed to measuretheir perceptions of the costs and benefits entailed in regional agreements.This project team aims to identify how the North/West Passage states might pursue a regional permitting agreement, what such anagreement would mean for each state\ue2\u20ac\u2122s Department of Transportation, and the level of industry demand in the eight states of theNorth/West Passage Corridor for regional permitting services