Ruling lets big trailers use roads

State troopers and safety advocates warn that a new state decision to relax length limits on tractor-trailers will pose dangers for motorists who meet long trucks on narrow, winding highways in the North Carolina mountains.

The state Department of Transportation is writing new rules to make 53-foot-long semitrailers legal on hundreds of miles of highways. The old length limit was 48 feet.

The change comes in response to an opinion from the state Attorney General's Office, issued Monday, that DOT length limits are more restrictive than allowed by state and federal law.

The longer trucks will be allowed on some two-lane mountain highways where crashes on hairpin curves have been blamed on 48-foot trailers that veered across center lines, said Lt. Everett Clendenin, a Highway Patrol spokesman. He cited crashes on U.S. 441 in Swain County, U.S. 64 in Clay County and U.S. 70 in Madison County.

"They're tracking across the center line already," Clendenin said. "So a 53-foot trailer is really going to present a problem up there, in our opinion."

Truckers and merchants protested last summer when the Highway Patrol began issuing $200 tickets for trucks pulling 53-foot-long trailers on highways where the long trailers had not been approved by state DOT regulators. Troopers were guided by a DOT map that marks routes in the National Truck Network, where trucks are allowed to pull twin trailers or single, 53-foot-long trailers.

Grocery chains were among those hurt by the enforcement, a trade group spokeswoman said.

"They were being ticketed every time they left their headquarters to deliver food to these stores," said Fran E. Preston, president of the 25,000-member N.C. Retail Merchants Association. Preston's group pressed Transportation Secretary Lyndo Tippett and Crime Control Secretary Bryan Beatty, who oversees the Highway Patrol, to seek an interpretation from Attorney General Roy Cooper.

Cooper's office sided with the critics in a three-page advisory letter issued Monday.

DOT may continue to decide which highways are safe for twin trailers, but it no longer may bar 53-foot trailers from interstates and other highways that, as of 1991, were in what is called North Carolina's federal-aid primary system.

"This interpretation expands the number of routes available to '53 foot semitrailers,' " said the letter signed by Ebony J. Pittman, assistant state attorney general.

State officials did not have complete figures for which highways and how many miles were affected by the change. Federal statistics show North Carolina had 21,711 miles of rural and urban federal-aid highways in 2005. The 1991 date referred to changes in federal transportation laws.

William C. "Bill" George of Rocky Mount, president of Eagle Transport Corp. and chairman of the N.C. Trucking Association, said the relaxed limits on 53-foot trailers "will bring North Carolina in line with almost every other state in the country that allows them on similar roads."

Truckers' stance

"One reason for the 53-foot trailers, to begin with, is so you can have fewer trucks hauling more goods," George said.

A national road safety advocate agreed that few states had been as restrictive as North Carolina. Gerald Donaldson, senior research director for Advocates for Highway and Auto Safety, said the longer, heavier trucks will cause more damage to minor roads and put more drivers at risk.

"These guys are going to be on roads with lots of vertical and horizontal curves and short sight distances," Donaldson said from his Washington office. "It will increase the risk of crashes, absolutely."

Jennifer Tierney of Kernersville, a board member for a national safety group called Citizens for Reliable and Safe Highways, said state officials should study new highways before allowing the longer trucks to use them.

"No matter whether these roads should be on there or not, this was a backhanded way of doing it," said Tierney, who lost her father in a 1983 crash that involved a tractor-trailer.

Clendenin said state enforcement of the 53-foot limit would be suspended until DOT issues a new map showing where the longer trucks are legal. A DOT spokesman said the new map should be ready in a few days.

Meanwhile, DOT officials will look for possible risks.

"DOT is putting together a plan to investigate any route that we may have concerns with," spokesman Ernie Seneca said. "We will do field studies, and if necessary we will restrict travel [by 53-foot trailers] on those routes by using other state law or DOT policy based on safety."

Preston said the relaxed limits will be good for retailers and consumers.

"I think it's exciting for all the grocery stores" that they can receive deliveries twice a week, Preston said.